When the April 2024 floods hit Dubai, cars were among the hardest-hit belongings, with thousands of vehicles damaged. Our audience had a lot of questions about car insurance and flood damage in the UAE, so we sat down with Neeraj Gupta, CEO of PolicyBazaar UAE, to get straight answers on what is covered and what is not.
Third-party vs comprehensive: the big difference
The first thing to check is which type of motor policy you hold.
- Third-party insurance covers damage your car causes to other people. It does not cover flood damage to your own car.
- Comprehensive insurance makes you eligible to claim for flood damage, subject to your policy’s terms and conditions.
Parked vs driven into water
If your car was parked, for example in your building’s basement or outside your villa, and it flooded, that is the kind of event comprehensive cover is designed for. If you saw standing water and chose to drive through it, the claim is likely to be very difficult. As Neeraj explained, the core idea of insurance is cover for events you cannot foresee, not for driving into danger.
Garages can usually tell what happened. A car that was switched off and flooded looks very different from one that was running and sucked water into the engine.
Can you claim from your building’s insurance?
Usually not. Insurance looks at the proximate cause, meaning the direct cause of the damage. If the whole area flooded because of the rain, the cause was the weather, not something the building did, so the building’s policy would not normally pay for your car.
Home insurance after the floods
- Building vs contents: home policies can cover the property, the contents or both. If you only insured the building, flood-damaged furniture and belongings will not be covered.
- Insured value: payouts depend on the value you declared, which may be lower than your home’s current market value.
- Loss of rent: landlords with loss-of-rent cover can be paid while a flood-damaged property cannot be lived in.
What to do if your car was damaged
- Be patient: insurers dealt with an unprecedented number of claims.
- Keep every photo and video of the car and the water levels.
- Read your policy terms so you know exactly what you can claim for.
- Speak to your insurer or broker about the claims process.
Every policy is different, so treat this as a guide and always check your own terms. Watch the full conversation above, and find more motoring advice in our Automotive section.
