Global insurer AXA has said it will pay out claims from up to 4,000 companies with business interruption cover affected by coronavirus.
The company has written to policyholders and said that compensation will be limited to three months’ earnings.
However, a case of Covid-19 must occur within a specified radius of a policyholder’s premises.
AXA Director Antoinette McDonald said it has additional customers whose policies only cover specifically named diseases that do not include Covid-19 and as a result the policyholders will not be covered.
The number of customers in this category is understood to be in the region of 10,000.
McDonald also warned that even for those policies which cover Covid-19 currently, AXA has been told by its reinsurers that Covid-19 will not be included at the next renewal of the policy.
“We are being very clear with our customers and brokers that while we are very happy to be able to honour these claims at this time, we will not be able to continue to offer Covid-19 cover when the policies are renewed because we are unable to get the risk reinsured ourselves,” she said.
