Significant changes to the law designed to enhance the level of protection provided by New Zealand’s Earthquake Commission (EQC) will see the cap for residential building cover raised from NZ$100,000 (US$68,300) to NZ$150,000 (US$102,409).
Lawmakers also removed the NZ$20,000 (US$13,654) EQC cover for contents, a move that Megan Woods (the minister responsible for the EQC) says will focus the commission’s claim management resources on resolving residential building and land damage claims.
New Zealand’s government says the EQC amendment act also empowers the commission to share more information about previous claims on a home.
Homeowners can now access more information about a property’s previous EQC claims, says Woods.
It also covers information about the assessed cost of replacing or reinstating damaged property, repair work that has been carried out and settlement amounts.
These changes will be phased in over 12 months from July.
Additionally, the time-frame for lodging a claim has been immediately extended from three months to two years.
“The review, and the changes that have been announced, have looked at the lessons, not only from the Canterbury earthquakes but other events since the current Earthquake Commission Act was enacted in 1993,” said EQC Chief Executive, Sid Miller.
“Along with these policy changes, we have also introduced a range of operational and organisation changes since 2017 to improve our claim management processes and customer experience.”
The EQC Act has been under review since 2012 as successive governments have considered changes to natural disaster insurance arrangements and the management of risk and recovery in New Zealand.
“These four common sense changes will improve the efficiency of New Zealand’s natural disaster insurance scheme and focus EQC’s claim managers on helping people fix their homes,” Woods added.
