With more and more extreme weather events hitting Quebec, how can you make sure you have the right insurance to deal with them?
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As for forest fire, lightning and wind, no insurer in Canada can exclude loss related to these events.
However, the situation is different when it comes to flooding and municipal sewer backups.
“[Pour être couvert], you must have purchased a special or specific endorsement, explains insurance broker Louise Cyr. It is imperative that we purchase adequate insurance coverage to cover our losses. It’s really special because we have three types of claims. We have lightning, wind and water. When it comes to insurance, it is considered different for everyone.
However, this may change in the coming years due to flooding.
“Floods, since 2017, the central government has asked insurers to provide guarantees, continues the expert. Unfortunately insurers have taken up the good habit of insuring people far from rivers and we are yet to see a national flood risk plan. Public safety wanted help from the private sector, but actually didn’t get it.”
The insurance broker believes that investment risk is necessary in the coming years to limit the risk of sewer backups.
“Hurricanes cause very targeted, very localized damage,” he says. Flooding is still a bit more, but it is almost exclusively in rivers. Municipal health facilities are overcrowded and a lot of intervention needs to be done at the level of municipalities and governments to ensure that we have facilities that can respond to these issues.
In the wake of the wildfires, insurers have suspended their services in California, fearing more losses.
In Quebec, Mr. Cyr didn’t believe it.
“When we approach large urban centers, it’s sure and sure that it scares insurers globally, but here our wildfires are often in very remote areas,” he explains.
“It may affect two or three villages, maybe a big paper mill, but to say that people will suffer from lack of insurance will make people worry,” he adds. I don’t believe there will be similar reactions from the insurance industry in the next decade.
Watch the full explanation in the video above.
