An AVP costs a few tens of euros a year and covers amounts running into millions. What goes wrong is almost never the sum insured, but two clauses: the care, custody and control exclusion and the intent clause.
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In brief
Personal liability insurance pays for damage that you, members of your household or your pets cause to other people, where you are liable for it in law. It covers both damage to property and personal injury, with a sum insured of usually € 1.250.000 or € 2.500.000 per event.
Damage to your own possessions is not covered, you cannot hold yourself liable, and neither is damage between people named on the same policy. That may seem obvious, but it is the basis for everything else.
The care, custody and control exclusion deals with the category in between: property that belongs to someone else but that you use as if it were your own. Borrowed, hired, being worked on or held in safekeeping. That risk is also known as the owner's risk, and with many insurers it is excluded or capped at a fixed amount.
What does personal liability insurance (AVP) cover?
The structure of the cover in three parts, with an overview per situation below.
The whole household
Who is insured
With family cover, everyone at the same address is insured.
You and your partner
Children living at home
Children studying away from home
Pets
Property and injury
What is covered
Damage to other people's possessions and injury you cause.
A window kicked in by your child
A dog bites a passer-by
Cycling into a car
The category in between
Care, custody and control
Someone else's property in your care: excluded, or up to a fixed limit.
Borrowed tools
Hired equipment
Motor vehicles always excluded
What is covered
Situation
Covered
Your child kicks a ball through the neighbours' window
Yes
Your child damages the neighbour's car
Yes
Your child damages your employer's lease car
No
You drop a borrowed drill
Sometimes
Damage caused with your car, scooter or light quadricycle (brommobiel)
No
Arson or other deliberate damage
No
This overview is general in nature and is not personal advice. What is actually covered, including exclusions, limits and the excess, is set out in the policy conditions and the insurance card (verzekeringskaart) of the insurer; you receive both before you take out cover. Taking out cover without advice? Then read what execution only means for you.
Where things go wrong in practice
Four points that make the difference between a policy that pays out and one that does not.
The care, custody and control exclusion: what it really comes down to
An example makes it clear. If your child damages the neighbour's car while playing football, that is covered. If he damages your employer's lease car, that loss falls under the care, custody and control exclusion and is not covered. On many policies care, custody and control is not excluded entirely but capped, for example at € 5.000 or € 12.500 per event. Motor vehicles are almost always excluded separately and in full.
What counts as a motor vehicle covers more than you think
Someone claimed for damage to a borrowed earth auger on his AVP at Kifid (the financial services complaints institute). The insurer rejected the claim because damage to borrowed motor vehicles was excluded. The disputes committee found for the insurer: an earth auger is a motor vehicle within the meaning of Article 1 of the Dutch Motor Insurance Liability Act (WAM), so the rejection was correct. Anything moved across the ground by mechanical force falls within that definition.
The exclusions differ from insurer to insurer, and that can be checked
Another Kifid case concerned damage to hired bicycles. The policyholder pointed out that his insurer's conditions did not exclude hired bicycles, unlike hired motor vehicles and static caravans. Differences of that kind between policies are exactly what we compare on.
Deliberately caused damage is never insured, and the amounts can be enormous. In one Kifid case, someone had been convicted of setting fire to a waste container; the buildings insurer of the supermarket next door claimed € 995.000. The liability insurer's reliance on the intent clause held up: the fact that the person responsible was of slightly diminished responsibility did not mean that he was free from blame.
Customers rate our service on four aspects: personal service, service delivery, availability and the outcome. The reviews are collected and published by NH1816 and come from customers who have actually taken out a policy with Finass Advies B.V. or reported a claim.
The provision that excludes damage to property belonging to someone else that you have in your care: borrowed, hired, being worked on or held in safekeeping. It is treated as though it were your own property, and damage to your own property is not insured. Some insurers exclude this entirely, others pay up to a fixed limit per event.
Is damage to a borrowed machine covered?
That depends on what it is. Kifid rejected a claim for a borrowed earth auger because it counts as a motor vehicle within the meaning of the WAM, and borrowed motor vehicles are almost always excluded in full. For an ordinary drill the position is different, and a maximum amount often applies.
Why is damage caused with my car not covered under the AVP?
Because the compulsory third-party cover on the vehicle itself applies to that. It is the same for a car, a motorcycle, a scooter and a light quadricycle, and the AVP therefore excludes such damage.
Are my children covered while they are studying?
With family cover, usually yes, including when they live away from home, as long as they are studying and are not working or living with a partner. Check this explicitly at the point when your child moves into student accommodation.
What happens in cases of intent?
There is then no cover, and that stands up all the way to the highest instance. In an arson case, Kifid held that slightly diminished responsibility does not mean that the person responsible is free from blame. The claim of almost a million euros remained at his own expense.
Am I covered abroad?
Usually worldwide, sometimes with a limit on duration. Fire and water damage to a rented holiday home is covered on many policies, and with some insurers only if that property is abroad.
Finass Verzekert is a trading name of Finass Advies B.V. We advise on and arrange non-life insurance on the basis of an objective analysis of several insurers, and receive commission for this from the insurer, which is included in the premium. You pay no separate advice fee. Before you take out cover, we establish your wishes and needs.
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