Usually, yes — buildings insurance normally covers storm damage. The complications are in the detail, and they are worth understanding before you pick up the phone, because the two or three things that decide most claims are decided early.
We are roofers, not insurance advisers. What follows describes how buildings policies commonly work, so you know what questions to ask. It is not advice about your policy, and it is not a prediction about your claim. Your insurer and your policy wording are the only authority on what you are covered for — read it, or ring them and ask.
The first thing that surprises people is that "storm" is a defined term in most policies rather than an ordinary English word. Insurers commonly set a threshold — often expressed as a wind speed, sometimes as a rate of rainfall or hail — and weather below it is not a storm for the purposes of the policy, however unpleasant it was.
This is why the date matters so much, and why a claim made for damage "found last week" is harder than one made for damage that appeared on a night the whole region remembers. Insurers check the weather records for your postcode against the date you give them.
Practical consequence: note the date the damage happened, or the date you first saw it, and be accurate about which of the two it is.
It is rarely the storm definition. It is the distinction between damage a storm CAUSED and deterioration a storm REVEALED.
Buildings policies cover sudden, accidental damage. They generally exclude wear and tear, gradual deterioration and lack of maintenance — and a roof is a component with a service life, which means age is always part of the picture.
So when a hundred-year-old slate roof loses slates in a gale, an insurer will ask whether the wind was strong enough to remove sound slates, or whether the nails had corroded through years ago and the wind simply found them. Those get different answers, and the second is a very common finding on older roofs.
This is not a reason to be pessimistic, and it is not a reason to be vague. A great many storm claims succeed. But a description that overstates the case tends to unravel when a loss adjuster looks at the roof, and an inaccurate account is worse for you than an accurate one. We describe what we actually find, including where age is part of it.
That last one catches people out. If you have had roof work done before, receipts and reports are worth digging out. A roof with a maintenance history is a different proposition from one that has not been touched in thirty years.
Most policies expect you to take reasonable steps to prevent further damage — you are not required to let water pour into the house while you wait for an adjuster. What they generally do not want is the permanent repair carried out before they have had the chance to inspect.
In practice that means making safe is usually fine and should be documented and invoiced separately; the full repair is better held until you have told them. If in doubt, ring them first — most insurers have a claims line open outside office hours precisely because storms happen at night.
Every policy carries an excess, and some carry a separate, higher excess for storm damage specifically. It is worth checking which applies before you start, because a repair that costs little more than the excess may not be worth claiming for once you account for the effect on your no-claims position and future premiums.
We are not going to tell you whether to claim. That depends on figures we do not have and on how you weigh a premium increase, and it is your decision. What we can give you is an accurate quotation, which is the piece of information the decision needs.
Worth checking your wording for, because they come up on roofs:
We inspect the roof, identify the work required and provide a written quotation describing the defect specifically. That is the document an insurer asks for, and a specific description carries considerably more weight than "storm damage to roof".
What we will not do is tell you your claim will succeed, describe deterioration as storm damage because it makes the claim easier, or put a figure on a quotation to suit an excess. Firms that do those things exist. They are not doing you a favour: an insurer who finds an inaccurate account tends to look harder at everything else, and the homeowner is the one left dealing with it.
T & T Roofing South Wales quotes free and without obligation across fifteen areas of South Wales, for insurance work and otherwise.
Ring them first, or at least early. They will tell you what they need and whether they want to inspect before repairs, which affects what you should and should not have done in the meantime.
Most policies expect you to take reasonable steps to prevent further damage. Keep that work and its invoice separate from the permanent repair, and tell your insurer what was done and why.
It can be, but expect the age of the roof to be part of the conversation. Insurers distinguish between damage a storm caused and deterioration a storm revealed, and on an older roof that question comes up more often.
We will write it to say accurately what we found. If that is storm damage, it will say so. What we will not do is describe deterioration as storm damage, because it does not survive a loss adjuster and it leaves you worse off.
Damage to the building is normally buildings cover and damage to belongings is contents cover, and many people hold them with different insurers. Check both, and photograph both.
Storm damage in South Wales? T & T Roofing South Wales will assess the roof, explain what needs repairing and give you a free, no-obligation quotation. Storm Damage Roof Repairs South Wales has the full detail, or call us on 07766 547309.
Tell us what the weather has done and what you can see from the ground. We will come back to you — usually the same day.
If water is coming in now, please call rather than email — 07766 547309.
