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Your Duty of Disclosure

Before you enter into a contract of general insurance with the insurers, you have a duty, under both the Insurance Act 1984 and the Marine Insurance Act 1909, to disclose to the insurer every matter that you know or could reasonably be expected to know which is relevant to the insurer’s decision to accept the risk and on what terms. You have the same duty of disclosure before you renew, vary, extend or reinstate a contract of general insurance.

Your duty does not require you to disclose matters:

  • that diminish the risk to be undertaken by the insurer;
  • that are of common knowledge;
  • that your insurer knows, or, in the ordinary course of its business, ought to know; or
  • as to which compliance with your duty is waived by the insurer.

Non-Disclosure

If you fail to comply with your duty of disclosure:

Where the Marine Insurance Act 1909 applies
The insurer may avoid the contract from inception

Where the Insurance Contracts Act 1984 applies
The insurer may be entitled to reduce our liability under the contract in respect of a claim, or, in certain circumstances, may cancel the policy or declare it never existed because it was not properly entered into. If your non-disclosure was fraudulent, the insurer may also have the option of avoiding the contract from the beginning.

Important Notices

  • 1. Claims
    The Policy does not provide cover in relation to events that occured before the contract was entered into.
  • 2. Excess
    An excess is the sum of money we will not pay in respect of a claim. The Schedule and the Policy details the Excesses which may be applicable.
  • 3. Acceptance of the Application
    This insurance will not be in force until the completed Application has been received and the risk accepted by the Company. The Company reserves rights to decline any Application.
  • 4. The way we handle your Personal Information
    We collect personal information from you for the purpose of providing you with insurance products, services, processing and assessing claims.You can choose not to provide this information, however, we may not be able to process your request.We may disclose information we hold about you to other insurers, an insurance reference service or as required by law. In the event of a claim, we may disclose information to and/or collect additional information about you from investigators or legal advisors.If you wish to update or access the information we hold about you, contact us.