Jewellery is a popular gift on Valentines Day, but many people don’t bother with insurance, as they figure it’s already covered by home insurance. Well, that may or may not be true when it comes to higher value items. In any case, what about repairs? Sometimes an embedded or specialised jewellery policy will cover accidental damage and professional repairs. A missing diamond from a tennis bracelet kinda spoils the item, so replacing that diamond with one that exactly matches the cut, colour and carat weight is essential.
Watches are a different thing and many high value Rolex, Patek, Jacob & Co, AP or other brands are becoming hard to insure, except via specialist brokers – and then only when stored in an approved safe or being worn on the wrist – elsewhere, like hotel safes, they ain’t covered.
Here are some general insights from Aviva;
Insurer Aviva is warning customers that not protecting their treasured items properly could lead to heartache, after seeing a staggering 43% increase in claims for high-end jewellery theft. The data, which looks at Aviva Private Client’s high-net-worth claims across 2022 and 2023, includes customers being mugged for expensive watches, opportunist thieves stealing jewellery stashed in cars, and numerous claims where burglars have forced entry into homes while people were away on holiday. In some particularly worrying incidents of crime, residents were still inside the property when thieves entered.
Thieves smashed car and house windows, disabled alarm systems, and even ripped out safes containing jewellery, with items stolen totaling hundreds of thousands of pounds, including luxury watches, expensive bracelets, diamond rings, diamond bracelets, diamond earrings, emeralds, and bespoke jewellery items.
Sadly, theft isn’t the only issue for customers when it comes to their expensive jewellery. Aviva data shows claims for accidental damage more than doubled across the year, while the insurer also saw numerous claims for accidental loss of jewellery.
Rupert Damms, Head of Risk Management North for Aviva, says:
“Valentine’s Day is the perfect time to surprise a loved one with precious jewels, but with jewellery theft on the rise across the U.K., protecting yourself and your valuables has never been more important.
“With opportunistic thieves targeting people in public, it’s crucial that individuals are sensible about when and where they wear expensive jewellery and think carefully about whether they want to have it on display. Inside the home, we urge people to make sure they lock their doors and windows, and ensure their security systems and safes are insurance approved, professionally installed, and that they are always used to store jewellery.
WHAT IS THE TRUE VALUE?
“It can also be easy to underestimate the value of items, particularly if the cost to replace luxury goods rises. If the worst does happen, underinsurance of valuable items can be a problem for customers when they come to claim, so ensuring you have the right insurance cover and up-to-date valuations of jewellery is also critical for both peace of mind and protection of assets.”
Aviva has been providing cover for burglaries and thefts since 1889. Its predecessor, The Mercantile Accident and Guarantee Company Ltd, was the first company in the U.K. to offer burglary insurance. The company’s landmark burglary department started writing risks in June 1889.
A claim from Aviva’s archives highlights that while the world may have changed significantly over the centuries, customer claims for jewellery remain the same. In 1892, the insurer paid out after a large quantity of jewellery was stolen from a Wigan-based jeweller, two days before Valentine’s Day. The stolen goods included eleven second hand silver watches and a large number of gold rings, with the estimated loss being around £70, equivalent to £11,146 today.
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