Your service charge
Ground Rent and Buildings Insurance
Ground rent
Most leaseholders pay £10 a year ground rent. This is invoiced half yearly in advance on 1 April and 1 October together with the estimated service charge. The annual ground rent is set out in your lease, and is fixed for the term.
Buildings insurance
The Council arranges the building insurance cover for your property. The annual premium is included in your service charge. Each year an updated schedule of cover is sent out to leaseholders.
How to make a claim: Please contact the buildings insurance company Zurich Municipal directly by calling 0800 0261 841. For non-urgent incidents please call within normal office hours or Email: homeclaims@uk.zurich.com
It is important that you report a claim to the insurance company promptly and no more than 90 days after the incident occurred. If you delay reporting the incident the insurance company may refuse your claim.
Please see below for more detailed information on the cover included in the buildings insurance:
Policy number: 10/006460/05500380
Period of insurance: From noon 1 April to noon 1 April the following year
Policyholder: You, the leaseholder
Insured premises: The property
Interested Parties: The Council as freeholder of the building
Insured risks and excesses: (what’s covered by the policy) Your buildings are insured against loss or damage caused by the following major events: Fire, smoke, explosion, lightning, earthquake, riot, civil commotion, strikes, labour or political disturbances, malicious damage, collision by vehicles, aircraft or animals, storm or flood, escape of water from any fixed tank, falling trees or branches, theft or attempted theft, subsidence, ground heave, or landslip, leakage of oil from any fixed oil-fired installation, damage caused by falling television aerials or satellite dishes. Malicious damage, theft or attempted theft and escape of water from any fixed tank are not insured if the buildings have been unoccupied for more than 30 days.
Policy excesses: When claiming for accidental damage you must pay the first £50. When claiming for subsidence you must pay the first £1,000. These apply to each property for each and every loss. No excesses apply to other claims.
Benefits and limitations
(some benefits included are limited as follows):
|
Benefit |
Limitation |
|
Sum insured |
The sum insured selected |
|
Legal liability as owner |
£5,000,000 |
|
Alternative accommodation or loss of rent |
20% of buildings sum insured |
|
Lock replacement following theft or loss of keys |
The reasonable cost of replacing and fitting locks of an identical type as those operated by the lost keys |
|
The costs in involved in tracing a leak |
£5,000 |
|
Emergency access |
£1,000 |
Please note the above is a summary and is not an exhaustive list of items covered. For full details of your policy cover and all terms and conditions, please refer to the buildings insurance policy document.
A buildings insurance Schedule and a policy booklet can be downloaded if needed.
Sum Insured: This is property specific and reflects the cost of rebuilding the property as part of the building up to a cost of £350,000.
If there are any changes to the use or occupation of the leasehold property please contact the Insurance Team by email: insurance@kingston.gok.uk or on 020 8770 5353 to notify them of this change.
You will need to arrange your own contents insurance cover for your belongings. We operate a special scheme for Tenants and Leaseholders Contents Insurance. To find out more about this scheme please contact Finance Operations on 0208 547 5413.
For more information, and to apply for Home Contents Insurance online please look at our insurance section