Am I covered for accidental damage at home?

Home and contents insurance is designed to help you with replacement or repairs to your home or contents caused by an insured event. This covers items lost or damaged in events like fire, storm, and theft,* but it doesn’t always cover items that you might unintentionally damage. That’s where accidental damage cover can come in handy.

What is accidental damage cover?

At Suncorp Insurance, we have an optional cover called ‘Accidental damage at home’, designed to provide cover for accidental loss or damage at the insured address. Think wine-spill nights instead of burst pipes, dropped laptops instead of collapsing rooftops, or cracked TVs instead of damage by falling trees.

Is accidental damage cover standard or optional?

With Suncorp Home and Contents Insurance, the Accidental damage at home option may be automatically included in your policy, depending on your level of cover.

Both Classic Extras and Classic Advantages level of cover include it as standard, meaning you’ll have coverfrom the date your policy is effective. If you have Classic cover, you can choose to add it to your policy for an additional cost. 

There are several other optional covers that are automatically included or can be added to your policy, depending on your level of cover. Read up on what your home and contents insurance covers so you can decide if you need any extras!

You can check the visual guide to Suncorp Home and Contents Insurance to easily find to what you need to know, and to see if any other extras suit your needs. Please ensure to check the Product Disclosure Statement, and any applicable SPDS, for full details.

Explore Home and Contents Insurance

What’s covered under Accidental damage at home?

Here are just a few example scenarios that our Accidental damage at home option may cover.

Accidental building damage

• When rearranging your furniture, you trip on the carpet and knock a heavy table’s corner straight into the plastered wall.
• After cooking up a get-together dinner, you accidentally place a hot pot on a benchtop, causing it to melt or crack.
• Your perfect doe-eyed child lovingly draws you pictures… all over your walls, floor, and fixed appliances – in permanent marker!

Accidental contents damage

• A child forgets to turn the bathroom tap off all the way, causing water to spill into the surrounding rooms and damage the carpets.
• A fly-away controller cracks the TV, slipping off during an intense videogame.
• When trying to balance dinner and your tablet from the kitchen to the dining room, you slip and drop your device onto the tiles, cracking both.

What’s not covered under Accidental damage at home?

Accidental damage at home option doesn’t cover everything. For example, if your house is damaged by water from a leak or burst pipe it’s not covered under accidental damage – but it may be covered under ‘Escape of Liquid’ in your home and contents insurance policy.

Other exclusions include (but not limited to):

• damage that was deliberately caused by you
• damage caused by renovations (this may be covered by your contractor’s tradie insurance)
• damage caused by tenants (this may be covered by landlord insurance)
• damage caused by pests, and
• damage caused by general property wear and tear.

For a full list of what’s covered and what’s not, check the PDS.

Is accidental damage cover worth it?

Mishaps and accidents can happen to anyone. Damage at home is often unthinkable until it happens.

It’s hard to avoid these at-home incidents, but having extra cover can provide peace of mind and a helping hand when needed. Consider whether the accidental damage cover is right for you and your situation.

If you want to also cover personal valuable items when out of the home such as your jewellery, watches or mobile phone, you may want to consider ‘Personal Valuables’ optional covers. Check the PDS to learn more.

How to claim

If you need to make a claim under the Accidental damage at home option, it’s easy. You can make a claim online or through the Suncorp App. The process is laid out in a step-by-step checklist to make claiming as clear as possible.

All you need is:

• your Suncorp Insurance policy number
• details about what happened and when the event occurred, and
• details of what has been affected, such as your cracked TV.

Once a claim has been made, you can stay in the loop by tracking its progress online.

Make a Claim

Read more:

• The impacts of water damage at home
• Does my home insurance cover termites?
• Things you may not know may be covered by your home and contents insurance

*We do not insure you for bushfire, storm, storm surge, flood or tsunami in the first 72 hours of your policy. Very limited exceptions apply. Refer to the PDS for more detail.

Insurance issued by AAI Limited ABN 48 005 297 807 trading as Suncorp Insurance. Limits, conditions and exclusions apply. Read the Product Disclosure Statement before buying this insurance. The Target Market Determination is also available.

This advice has been prepared without taking into account your particular objectives, financial situation or needs, so you should consider whether it is appropriate for you before acting on it.