Guest Blogger: How to Properly Cover your Home Contents from DIY Accidents

Guest Blogger #264, Entry #773, November 21, 2011

DIY disasters are something of a comedy subject, but they can be serious business. Even if you manage to avoid serious injury and your accidents are more slapstick than self-harm, you may still feel pain in your pocket. That’s why you need to check your home and contents insurance policy before you even think about heading down the DIY store.

Before you renovate, ensure your DIY projects are covered

Image via: Archinspire

A specialist home insurance policy, varies from area to area, so it’s well worth reading the small print and checking with the company if you are still uncertain. Some policies do cover damage caused by do-it-yourself projects, though with many you’ll need to get optional add-on accidental damage cover. It’s usually not a great deal extra, though the premium cost can vary depending on both the total limit of cover you get as well as how much of an excess you agree to; the latter is the amount that’s deducted from any payout you get for a claim, meaning you must cover it from your own pocket.

A bonus with accidental damage cover is that incidents other than DIY mistakes are covered, such as spilling wine or dropping an expensive vase. Usually you are covered for accidents caused by children, though sometimes there are exclusions for people working as childminders. Note also that many policies exclude damage you cause while attempting to repair an appliance.

Make sure you have checked your insurance policy before your DIY project.

So are you really likely to have a DIY disaster? Well, it’s more likely than you think. According the Society for the Prevention of Accidents, more than 200,000 people a year are injured through DIY. About 40% are injured by tools, 26% by machinery and another 19% by materials.

Meanwhile a 2010 survey showed one in 10 homeowners have faced unexpected financial bills thanks to a DIY accident, with insurers paying out £235 million to repair the damage; another survey put the average cost of an accident at just over £400. Perhaps not surprisingly, Easter Monday is by far the busiest day of the year for DIY claims.

The most commonly cited example of a catastrophic DIY disaster is mistakenly nailing or drilling through a pipe, particularly when its cased behind a wooden wall or in a floor: claims of £1,500 or more aren’t out of the question here.

There are so many claims that there’s even a DIY Disasters website where shamefaced posters can confess their blunders. Recent highlights include a badly fitted bathroom cabinet that fell down and crashed straight through the bottom of the bath, a man who left a belt sander unattended and returned to find his patio now had a dip in the middle, and a man who drilled so far while putting shelves into a cupboard that he unwittingly pushed large piles of dust and wall plaster straight onto his daughter’s bed.

Welcome your finished DIY project with open arms!

Still, the rest of the world is just as capable of comedic mishaps. One man in New Zealand somehow managed to plasterboard a hallway with his telephone on the wrong side of the boarding. And an Australian man became a YouTube sensation after somehow managing to plumb a sink such that turning on one tap made water come out of the other.

For more DIY ideas on Stagetecture, & Stagetecture’s YouTube Channel, click here.