The price of protection

- David Pine, NZIJ Risk Management Ltd


 The first occurred in a rather nice inner city suburb of Wellington. Our client, who is a tradesman, parks his van in the street overnight as his section is not drive-on. He has been doing this for 4 years. He keeps most of his tools in his premises but always has some in the van for smaller jobs that he can do at weekends or on his way to his premises.

One night thieves broke into the van. They were apparently after the radio, which wasn’t particularly valuable, but they wrenched it out of the dashboard. One of the thieves must have then looked in the back of the van because in their usual place, hidden under a thick blanket, were our client’s tools. The whole lot were stolen.
At first our client thought the value of the stolen tools would amount to about $2000, but after doing an inventory and pricing the tools at his usual merchant the total exceeded $7000.  

He was insured for $5000 for burglary from the van, less the excess of $1000, so his maximum claim was $4000. At the moment the insurance assessor is helping our client to work out a fair value for the tools, given that many of them are older but are the type that can last a lifetime. Damage to the van will not be covered because it is insured for third party only.

The other claim also ocurred in a nice suburb, this time in Auckland. It involved another burglary from a vehicle, which was a very nice car and the pride and joy of our young client.

His $1500 radar detector was stolen, along with CD’s and some clothing. All up it came to $3500. Then there was the smashed front window of the car and damage to the door. Repairs came to some $2000.

The excess for malicious damage to this particular car is higher than normal, at $1500. The excess for the personal effects stolen is a more reasonable $300 but these items will be depreciated by the claims assessor
according to their age.

In both these cases our clients will be significantly out of pocket even though they are insured. Also the sheer inconvenience and trauma of these events is huge. Their lives have been disrupted by mindless ratbags.
Will there be fewer cars burgled in NZ in the future ?  No. Trends suggest there will be more. So what can we do to prevent this happening to us ? Actually, quite a bit.

Don’t leave anything in view inside your car and preferably leave nothing in it at all. Fit a good alarm and ensure that a would-be thief can see that your car has an alarm.

Inconvenient to leave nothing in the car? Absolutely. Expensive to fit a decent   alarm? Probably.  Sensible? Definitely.