Elemental damage

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hazards in terms of the insurance industry are damages caused by the action of nature. Damage caused by natural forces includes , for example, damage caused by storms , hail , floods , earthquakes , avalanches , snow pressure and volcanic eruptions .

Flood on the banks of the Rhine in Cologne , April 1983

Insurability

Storm damage has been insured in the insurance industry for many years. It is customary, in the form of the connected home insurance together with the fire insurance , also the insurance against

  • Storm including hail and
  • Tap water (no elemental damage)

to acquire.

The consideration of the insurability of extended natural hazards is more differentiated . This means i. d. R. Insurance coverage against

and partly too

This damage is by most fire insurance to protect buildings and most household insurance not included. While on average only a tiny fraction of all buildings burns down each year , for example one of the extremely rare severe earthquakes in Germany that is possible in parts of Baden-Württemberg , for example, can damage thousands of buildings in one fell swoop, leaving many of the reserves Insurance companies are insufficient to cover the damage. An insurance policy that covers natural hazards and has many customers in the endangered area therefore requires enormous reserves or expensive reinsurance .

Damage caused by natural forces is therefore cumulative events , i. H. a loss event leads to a large number of losses.

This prompts many insurance companies to arrange the insurance of natural hazards in building insurance , household contents insurance and contents insurance separately. The insurability is based u. a. after zoning that assesses the risk of flooding and landslides or avalanches. The collective of customers therefore bears part of the risk, so that a greater risk to the insurance location leads to higher insurance premiums and deductibles.

In the so-called extended elementary insurance or combined elementary insurance, the individual risks cannot usually be selected or removed. The necessity of risk equalization in the collective means that a Bavarian alpine farmer also pays for the risk of storm surges of a customer on a Hallig and this in turn pays part of his contribution for avalanche damage.

The GDV has developed a zoning system for flooding, backwater and heavy rain (ZÜRS) for the entire insurance industry. For this purpose, flood events with ascending return periods (annualities) were simulated and four hazard classes (GK) were determined:

  • GK 4 - statistically once every 10 years a flood
  • GK 3 - statistically once every 10–50 years a flood
  • GK 2 - statistically once every 50–200 years a flood
  • GK 1 - statistically less than once every 200 years a flood

ZÜRS thus enables a precise risk classification in the area of ​​flooding for all areas in Germany. With the ZÜRS public system , information about local natural hazards is made accessible in a simple and easily understandable form on the Internet. Data are currently available for the federal states of Lower Saxony, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt (status: July 2014). Other federal states are to follow.

According to industry information, around one percent of the buildings in Germany cannot be insured against flood damage. A survey by the Rhineland-Palatinate consumer center from autumn 2015 shows that this percentage is actually much higher. Obviously, such high insurance premiums are often demanded in hazard classes 3 and 4 that buildings can in fact not be insured at a reasonable price.

Development in Germany

Building owners in Baden-Wuerttemberg used to have compulsory protection from the Badische Feuerversicherung , a monopoly insurance , as well as protection against natural hazards , as did many citizens in the new federal states with the state monopoly insurance of the GDR . As Allianz took over these contracts, a large number of victims were insured during the floods on the Oder (1997) and Elbe (2002) . According to the General Association of the German Insurance Industry , an average of 35 percent of households had natural hazard insurance for their residential buildings in 2013. The insurance density has increased by 16 percentage points since the Elbe flood in 2002.

While the classic building insurance against fire, storm and tap water damage has a good market penetration, the voluntary extended insurance against natural hazards has only been noticed since the floods on the Oder and Elbe rivers. This is exacerbated by further flood damage caused by heavy rain events , so that the demand for insurance cover increases.

In 2015, insurers paid out around 2.1 billion euros for damage caused by natural hazards. The biggest loss event was hurricane Niklas . He alone caused damage of 750 million euros to insured buildings. In 2014, the insured damage amounted to around two billion euros.

Situation in Switzerland

In Switzerland , damage caused by the following events count as natural hazards:

  • Flood
  • flooding
  • Storm (= wind of at least 75 km / h that knocks over trees in the vicinity of the insured property or covers buildings)
  • hail
  • Avalanches
  • Snow pressure
  • Rockslide
  • Falling rocks
  • landslide

No further dangers can be included or excluded. The natural hazard insurance is a component of the fire insurance . In most of the cantons (except Geneva , Uri , Schwyz , Ticino , Appenzell Innerrhoden , Wallis , Obwalden ) every building is insured by the respective “cantonal building insurance”. These have a monopoly on building fire insurance. In the cantons in which there is no cantonal building insurance, the building can be insured with a private insurer.

swell

  1. Detailed information on ZÜRS public ZÜRS public - Recognizing natural hazards with a click of the mouse ( memento of the original from November 29, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gdv.de
  2. Kerstin Leitel: Money is only available with an additional policy . In: Handelsblatt . No. 104 , June 4, 2013, ISSN  0017-7296 , p. 7 .
  3. Consumer Center Rhineland-Palatinate eV: The insurability of damage caused by natural forces in residential building insurance in Rhineland-Palatinate. (PDF; 346.9 kB) (No longer available online.) December 3, 2015, formerly in the original ; accessed on March 8, 2016 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.vz-rlp.de  
  4. GDV: Insure more people against floods. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on July 27, 2014 ; accessed on May 27, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gdv.de
  5. GDV: "Niklas" causes damage of 750 million euros. Retrieved December 29, 2015 .
  6. GDV: Property insurers paid two billion euros for storms, heavy rain and hail. Retrieved January 5, 2015 .