Australian insurer Suncorp says it has received over 34,000 claims relating to the recent flooding in the Queensland and New South Wales areas.
The firm said that four out of five claims related to home damage from the disaster, which it is now counting as four ‘separate natural hazard events’. Suncorp reported that 60% of claims come from Queensland, with the remainder coming entirely from New South Wales.
The insurer said in a statement: “Based on early provisional forecasts, Suncorp’s net retained loss from these events has remained unchanged at around $75 million, with recoveries being triggered under a combination of Suncorp’s various reinsurance covers including Aggregate Excess of Loss (AXL) treaty, dropdown covers, main catastrophe program, and the quota share arrangement in the Queensland home portfolio. Following these events, Suncorp remains well protected for the remainder of the year.”
It added: “Given the recent events, but reflecting the strength of the remaining reinsurance cover, the Group’s latest estimate of natural hazard costs for the full year has increased to around $1.1bn (previously $1,075m).”
Suncorp released detailed figures on the pressure put on it by the recent flooding. While actual claims totalled 34,083, it said that it projected that number to rise to 44,750. 77% of claims were currently for home and it estimated that this proportion would roughly stay the same.
The insurer also said that it had ‘strong reinsurance protection in place’, having purchased additional AXL cover in the first half of the year.
Recent figures put on Twitter by the Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) put the total number of claims related to the floods at 144,906. The ICA estimate that the current cost of claims is now $2.174bn, a figure it reached based on the costs arising from previous flood events.
