Insurance claims for fallen trees

If a tree has come down and damaged your house, a standard buildings policy will typically cover the damage it caused, subject to your excess and to the event meeting the policy's definition of a storm. What it typically will not cover is the cost of removing a tree that fell without damaging anything insured, and most standard policies exclude fences and gates altogether. The two questions that decide most claims are whether the tree was healthy before it fell, and whether the person who owned it knew it was not. Everything else follows from those.

This guide is general information, not legal advice. Never assume your policy matches the general position described here. Read your own wording, or ring your insurer and ask.

What buildings and contents cover typically does

Buildings insurance covers the structure of your home and its permanent fixtures, so where a tree or a large limb falls on the house, the garage, the conservatory or the drive, the damage is normally the buildings claim. Contents insurance covers what is inside, so a tree through the roof that soaks the bedroom is usually two parts of the same claim.

Three points catch people out.

Removing the tree is treated separately from the damage. Policies commonly pay to remove a fallen tree where it has to be cleared to repair insured damage. Where a tree has come down in the garden and hit nothing insured, the removal is typically your own cost, however large the tree is. That is the most common surprise in this whole area.

Fences and gates are usually excluded. The Association of British Insurers is explicit that gates and fences are very susceptible to wind damage and are for that reason excluded by most standard buildings policies. A tree that flattens 20 metres of fence and nothing else may well leave you with no claim at all.

There is a definition of "storm". The ABI gives the usual industry criteria as wind gusts of at least 55mph, torrential rain of at least 25mm an hour, snow to a depth of at least 30cm in 24 hours, or hail heavy enough to cause damage. If a tree came down on a still day, it did not come down in a storm, and the claim goes down a different route.

Policies vary a great deal on all three. Check your own schedule and wording, and ask the insurer before you assume anything.

Storm damage against a tree that was already dangerous

A healthy, reasonably maintained tree brought down by an exceptional wind is nobody's fault. The affected party claims on their own policy and that is the end of it. The law does not make a tree owner an insurer of their tree.

A tree that was dead, decayed, diseased or visibly unstable is a different matter. Tree owners owe a duty of care to take reasonable steps to avoid foreseeable harm, and an owner who knew or should have known a tree was unsafe and did nothing may be liable in negligence for the damage it causes. That is the test your insurer will apply if it wants to recover from somebody. As the ABI puts it, you would need to show the other party was at fault to be able to claim against them.

Insurance is also not a maintenance contract. Policies cover sudden and unforeseen damage, not general upkeep, and most require you to keep the property in good repair. If your own obviously dying ash comes through your own roof, expect questions. Ash dieback and ten signs a tree needs attention cover what a reasonable owner is expected to notice.

What to do first

1. Safety before anything else. Call 999 if anyone is hurt or a road or footpath is blocked. If anything is near overhead cables, treat them as live, keep well clear and call 105, the free national number for your electricity network operator. Do not approach hung-up limbs and do not start a chainsaw.
2. Photograph everything before it moves. Wide shots showing the tree and the damage together, the base and root plate including lifted turf and torn roots, close-ups of the failure point showing decay or a torn fork, the damage to the building with something in shot for scale, and anything touching cables or a boundary.
3. Tell your insurer before you clear. Most have 24-hour emergency helplines. The ABI advises contacting your insurer as soon as is reasonably possible and, where emergency work is needed to prevent further damage, telling them, taking photos or video and keeping an itemised invoice, because it forms part of the claim.
4. Do only what safety requires. Make safe now, clear later. If wood must be removed, ask the crew to keep a section through the failure point until the insurer has seen it.
5. Keep every receipt, including the emergency call-out, temporary repairs and the tree work, even if you are not sure they are claimable.
6. Do not admit liability if someone is holding you responsible. Refer it to your own insurer.

When it is your neighbour's tree

"Their tree, their problem" is the most common misunderstanding in this subject, and it is usually wrong.

Where a healthy tree owned by your neighbour blows onto your house in a storm, the normal outcome is that you claim on your own buildings policy and your insurer decides whether it is worth pursuing theirs. Your insurer can only recover by showing your neighbour was negligent, which means showing the tree was in a condition a reasonable owner would have acted on. Without that, your own policy pays, and you may still bear your excess.

That makes what you did before the tree fell important. If you had written to your neighbour about a tree you thought was dangerous, that letter or email is the most valuable document in the file, so find it before anything is cleared. If they had a report, or had work quoted and not done, that matters too. Raise concerns in writing from the start, factually rather than accusingly, and keep copies.

The fallen wood remains your neighbour's property. You can make your own property safe, but do not cut anything still rooted on their land without consent, and offer the timber back. Storm-damaged tree: who is responsible covers the liability side, and cutting a neighbour's overhanging branches the ordinary boundary position.

Evidence that helps a claim

• dated photographs from before the failure, including anything showing the tree leaning, dying or with deadwood
• correspondence with a neighbour, a landlord, a managing agent or the council about the tree
• invoices for previous tree work, which show the tree was being maintained
• any survey or inspection record, however informal, including a note of when you last walked round
• the photographs taken immediately after the failure, especially of the root plate and the break
• the contractor's invoice for the making-safe work

What an arboricultural report is for

An arboricultural report is a written assessment by a qualified consultant. In an insurance context it does one of three jobs: establishing the condition of a tree before it failed, establishing whether a standing tree is a present risk, or, in subsidence claims, establishing whether a tree is contributing to ground movement and what to do about it without causing heave.

Insurers usually want it from someone independent and suitably qualified, such as an Arboricultural Association Registered Consultant or a member of the Institute of Chartered Foresters, rather than from the contractor who will do the work. It is a professional fee, separate from the tree work and not on our price card. It earns its cost in a disputed liability claim, in a subsidence claim where a tree is blamed, and where you want evidence that a tree you own is sound before a storm rather than after one. Tree roots and house foundations covers the subsidence side.

Getting the tree dealt with

We are an introducer. We pass your enquiry to one vetted local tree surgeon who covers your area. Emergency and storm work is priced on site, because nobody can quote a failed tree from a description. Once the site is safe, the rest is quoted against our price card, waste included:

Anything over £1,200, over 15 metres, over a road, near cables or touching a building goes to a free survey. Give the invoice to your insurer with the photographs.

• Tree removal and tree felling
• Stump grinding and stump removal
• Crown reduction where the tree can be kept and made safer
• Tree removal cost guide and garden clearance