Insurance.

[Martin Thomas]

Boy, what a headache. I've just finished doing my insurance for our home & contents. Collections are a real minefield. I think mine are all covered for theft, accidental damage (2 young boys) or whatever. But I still have to chase these hard working Biante people up & hope they have some sort of purchasing record as I have stupidly lost a couple of reciepts. I was wondering if anyone has heard of any specialists for this type of thing or maybe I should just run the video recorder over the whole house & keep the tape at work?

[cscollector]

Hi Martin,

I have too been through the saga of insurance. I wonder if it depends on the insurer. I have told them about my collection and they said to add the total value to the overall contents. I have also taken a video of my collection (and rest on contents as well) just to be safe.

Does the new site have the old cars still? If so maybe you could see if the prices are still there?

Christian

[XR8]

An interesting point that has been raised here..
I've checked around when getting home insurance, and they
all have different ideas on our beloved collections of cars..
Some will cover, some won't; so I've made sure that mine will.
When I get organised I'll be taking digital pictures of everything and I'll burn a CD. Hopefully this will be good enough for evidence, along with bank statements, etc!!

[holden_v8man]

i have gone through this process.....some thoughts to help you

There is a program being offered on ebay which is a database program which allows you to catolog all your models with pictures, price paid, purchased from , date etc

the program is approx $30.00 and it great.

it allows you to catolog everything and prints out a spreadsheet.

i have the collection on my laptop and have printed out the list and put with my insurance papers....the only problem i have found with the program is that you can't save the list to a DVD/CD.


u will find the program in the die cast section on ebay most times


Norm

[15247]

Holden V8man,
I have a similar programe to the one advertised. The one on ebay, is the picture colour of the programe page pinky- purple? If it is, its the same one ive got. To burn it to CD you have to go into the programe file, there will be 2 folders. 1 will be about 66kb's, the one with all your model info, depending on how many models you have will in the megabyte size. Click on the largest file and that will burn to cd.
I hope all that makes sense.

[toddy05]

I have spoken to insurers about mine too and the common comment is that they need only be covered under general contents (good news). The only way they should be insured as a "collection" is if the removal/loss of one model (or whatever it is) devalues the worth as a whole. Since most of us collect individual models even with a theme the whole collection would not suddenly plummet if one went missing beyond what that individual model was worth, the rest would still be worth the same. However if one of the 77 fords from the 1/64 miniset went missing that set would dramatically lose value. But they are still counted as an individual item (the twin set). I don't think I am explaining myself well. Whatever though we may call them a collection but to the insurers they are just individual contents.....

[toddy05]

PSPS I use Excel to keep a record of what I have. I have column for purchase price and a column for replacement value (which I gain through approximate averaging from ebay) and the tallies at the bottom are automatically added. I also take photos of the models to prove I have them. I don't keep receipts though as the spreadsheet and photos prove ownership....

[castkrazy]

I have spoken to insurers about mine too and the common comment is that they need only be covered under general contents (good news). The only way they should be insured as a "collection" is if the removal/loss of one model (or whatever it is) devalues the worth as a whole. Since most of us collect individual models even with a theme the whole collection would not suddenly plummet if one went missing beyond what that individual model was worth, the rest would still be worth the same. However if one of the 77 fords from the 1/64 miniset went missing that set would dramatically lose value. But they are still counted as an individual item (the twin set). I don't think I am explaining myself well. Whatever though we may call them a collection but to the insurers they are just individual contents.....


Mostly a collection can only be lumped under your general contents insurance if the total value of your collection is under a certain $ amount , soon as you reach more than that limit it must generally be added as a collection and a premium will then be added to account for the extra insurance needed .

Then once you reach a further high $ amount the premium is raised again to a higher amount and proof of ownership is required in some form or another including a detailed list of models/collectables , then you need accidental additional coverage for mishaps that may occur and of course there is another added premium to cover this .

Of course the policy can vary from one company to another but most people think the average home and contents covers everything and it's not until you need to make a claim before you realise you weren't covered for this or that or you are underinsured , and by that time it's way too late which is the last thing anybody needs at such a time .

Insurance what a headache , but you can't afford to be without it . :rolleyes:

[15247]

Castkrazy is right. My insurance company GIO said if my collection was valued over $2000 it must be insured as a collection. If its not, they will only pay up to that amount, $2000.