Does Home Insurance Cover My Watch?

Home insurance (or, more accurately, home contents insurance) is essential to protect the contents of your home. But when it comes to valuable items, like watches, many homeowners wonder if their home insurance policy extends to cover them adequately.

Let’s look at whether home insurance in the UK covers your watch and what you can do to properly protect your timepiece.

Home insurance Vs watch insurance

Whether or not your home insurance covers your watch depends on the type of policy you have and the value of your watch.

Here are some key points to consider:

Coverage Limits: Most standard home insurance policies have coverage limits for individual items. This means that there is a maximum amount the insurer will pay for a single item. If your watch exceeds this limit, you may need to list it separately on your policy as a high-value item.

Single Item Limits: The single item limit is the maximum amount your insurer will pay for a single item within the contents insurance portion of your policy. In the UK, this limit typically ranges from £1,000 to £2,000. So if your watch is worth more than this limit (and most high end watches will be), you should inform your insurer to ensure it is adequately covered.

Accidental Damage: Most home insurance policies don’t offer coverage for accidental damage as standard. This is obviously pretty important in the case of watches. Accidental damage coverage may protect your watch if, for example, you accidentally drop it and the glass or mechanism is damaged.

Loss and Theft: Standard home insurance policies typically cover theft of your possessions within your home, but coverage for loss or theft away from your home may require additional coverage or a separate policy.

Policy Exclusions: Always review your policy documents carefully to understand any exclusions related to watches or valuables. Some policies may exclude coverage for certain types of jewellery or watches.

How to make sure your watch is properly covered

In summary, your home insurance may give you sufficient protection for your watch, but equally it may not. Check with your home insurer.

The most complete coverage for your watch will come from a specialist watch insurer, like Coverbase.

High value limits: We know that watches can be expensive. That’s why we’ll cover any watch with a value up to £20,000. We have a limit of 5 watches per single policy although the total value of all your watches insured by us can’t exceed £30,000.

Theft anywhere: 15,058 watches were reported as stolen across the UK in 2022. That’s a lot of watches. We offer away from home cover as standard.

Accidental damage as standard: If your watch gets damaged, we’ll cover the costs of the repair.

Overseas coverage: With Coverbase, you can choose to extend the theft and damage cover on your watch overseas to give you that extra peace of mind when travelling abroad.

Dedicated claims team: We know how to deal with claims relating to high end watches. It’s what we do.

While standard home insurance in the UK can provide some coverage for your watches, it's really important to assess whether the coverage is sufficient for your specific needs.

High-value watches may require additional protection, such as specified items coverage or valuables insurance, to ensure they are adequately insured against various risks.

Taking the time to understand your policy and the value of your watches will help you make informed decisions about protecting your most cherished timepieces.