Flood Insurance

Hopefully this won't be a long post because our friends are coming over soon.  I need to get dressed.   But I think I have to write this and get my anger out. Otherwise I'll be in a bad mood.

So the other day I saw something on Facebook with people complaining about those in Queensland who didn't get flood insurance. There were some messages along the lines of why should we help those who didn't bother to be prepared?  

Now I will say it's a bit irresponsible to not have ANY house insurance.  But since most of us make mistakes in terms of preparation, I say we should still offer these people help and compassion.

What about people who HAVE house insurance, but didn't know they also needed flood insurance on top of the regular insurance?  Or maybe they knew, but adding that extra bit was very costly.  So they just hoped for the best.

This article in The Australian says that only one of the main insurance company in Brisbane automatically covers floods.  If you live in eastern Queensland, what else are you worried about besides floods?  I mean...yeah.  There's other stuff. But aren't floods the main worry? Why even get insurance if it's not going to cover floods?

It's ridiculous.

Suncorp is the company that automatically insures for floods.  They have also been nice enough to pledge 100 thousand dollars to the flood fund thing.  That's very decent of them. Although since they're an insurance company, I'm going to assume they're for the most part...evil. I'm JOKING.  Sort of.

The good news is the government is putting pressure on the other insurance companies to be compassionate.  Anna Bligh says, I call on insurance companies to act with compassion in the face of this event.  It's not in the interests of anyone in our community, including those companies, to stall or delay recovery but to show flexibility and compassion.

In other words....Don't act like an insurance company.

The not-covering-flood thing is really nuts.  It's like buying expensive health coverage for your family.  You pay all this stuff a month. You could have saved that money, and set up you own personal health fund. Then your child is diagnosed with Leukemia. You file a claim, and then hear back from the company.  We're sorry. We don't cover cancer.

Anyway, I hope the insurance companies listen to the government and do the right thing.