What Protection Does Special Perils Insurance Give You?

With the weather becoming more and more unpredictable, it's best to give yourself and your vehicle a bit more protection. Luckily, insurers have this thing called special perils, which can help with unfortunate vehicle mishaps. 

Every vehicle is covered by an insurance policy to protect its drivers and owners from financial loss or damage in the event of a vehicle mishap.

Even though a Comprehensive Insurance Policy (first party) offers arguably the widest coverage among other plans, there is still room for more protection, which explains why there are still other optional benefits.

While it's common for most vehicle owners to add on optional coverage such as windscreen protection, many still do not take the opportunity to add on special perils, which to us is perhaps the more essential extra coverage.

But what is special perils, and what protection does it provide?

Special perils is a vehicle insurance add-on that covers your car against loss or damage caused by natural disasters. Depending on the perils covered by your insurer, they usually protect you against typhoons, storms, landslides, and most important of all, floods. 

This additional coverage will compensate you in the event of car loss or damage due to any natural disaster. 

Do you need special perils coverage?

Many say that you should definitely get special perils coverage if you live in a flood-prone area where flooding occurs. 

While this is true, the Klang Valley in recent times has shown that flooding can easily occur anywhere at any time, which is why you should get the extra coverage anyway, despite not living in flood-prone areas. Water damage in cars is not cheap to fix and can sometimes cost more than the car itself if the car is fully submerged. 

The hard-hitting weather in recent times has also caused things such as landslides and falling trees to hit parked cars. If you don't have special perils protecting your car, you're on your own in trying to get your car rescued or fixed. Special perils lend you a helping hand where you are not burdened by all the cost of fixing it.

How much do special perils cost?

The cost of special perils coverage varies according to insurance providers, but generally, it will set you back 0.5% of your vehicle's total value, which is not a lot to pay for added safety. As an example, if your vehicle is worth RM60k, the special perils add-on will only cost you RM300. Some even go as low as 0.2%, so it really does depend on your insurance provider.

How to add on special perils?

You may add on special perils to your coverage anytime you want. All you need to do is call your insurance provider and request the add-on, and we're pretty sure they'll be accommodating. 

It's best to add on special perils when you renew your annual vehicle insurance coverage, as some insurance providers will request a vehicle inspection if you try to add it on in the middle of your current insurance policy. 

The reason for this is to verify that your vehicle is not already damaged, as some will try to cheat the system by adding on special perils only after getting caught out by water or natural disaster damage.

Are special perils worth it?

Yes, we talked extensively about how special perils can help insure you against floods, but it covers you from many more unexpected damages due to natural disasters, which is why it's just best to have it on your insurance policy. 

As they say, disasters aren't natural, and neither is climate change. Since we're definitely going through climate change which will cause more natural disasters, so why leave your vehicle unprotected? 

At the end of the day, you'll just end up paying heartbreaking amounts of money to get your car fixed when in the first place, it could have only cost 0.5% of your car's value.