Did your house Insurance premium go up a lot after a claim?

[munchkintrouble]

We've got accidental damage cover and a battery pack has leaked on our stair carpet. It's completely stained the carpet and looks terrible. I've tried everything but it's not moving.

I've never made a claim on our insurance in 20 years so wondering if I'm wise to claim and get a new carpet (we have new for old insurance etc) or if it's not worth the hassle or hike in premium?

What would you do?

If it’s just one stair it’s leaked across would it be possible to just replace that part of the carpet rather than needing to do the whole stairs? Obviously depends on how deep a pile etc you have as to whether it would look odd/stand out I guess

I had to claim for a washing machine flood. Whole downstairs needed new flooring, doors, skirting boards, kick boards and most contents that were on the floor including hoover, washing machine, cupboards etc needed replacing. My premium only went up by about £20 a year.

Cover with a rug?

I had a £3k mountain bike stolen and don't think the premium went up much at all - maybe £20/30?

However, in your case, what's the policy excess, what's the cost of replacing the carpet and what's the rest of the stair carpet like?

If the carpet you have is still available, you might be able to get a small independent fitter to replace the damaged part with a remnant for not very much - when we had our living room and stairs etc carpeted, they did a lot of the stairs with the offcuts of the main piece of carpet - it's not one long piece, but lots of individual stairs, which you can't see when laid.

Or you could just live with it until you can justify replacing the whole stair carpet. I think I'd only bother with an insurance claim if my stair carpet was expensive and relatively new and I was quite houseproud and had lots of visitors. None of these apply to me.

The carpet is quite old, I wouldn't bother trying to patch it as it's just not worth it.
I have a dog & a toddler so wasn't in a rush to replace but I certainly can't live with this stain, it looks awful.
Not sure if to claim or not, I might get a carpet quote first and see how much a stair carpet would be?

@EdwardCullensBiteOnTheSide

Cover with a rug?

A rug on the stairs isn't a good idea.

Cover with a rug?

There’s always one!