Part of the valuables cluster. These conditions apply alongside the household wording covered in the property guide.
Once the values on a schedule pass a certain point, cover stops being unconditional. The policy carries security conditions, and those conditions are the mechanism by which an underwriter accepts a risk that would otherwise be declined. Read in that light they are not obstacles — they are the price of the cover. Read too late, they are the reason a genuine claim is refused.
Condition or recommendation
Everything begins with this distinction, because both appear in the same document, often in the same list, in similar language.
A condition forms part of the contract. If it was not met at the time of the loss, the insurer may decline the claim or reduce the settlement, and the fact that the breach had nothing to do with how the loss happened does not always help. A recommendation is advice; ignoring it does not void cover, though repeated refusal may affect renewal.
The operative language is what separates them: warranted, it is a condition of this policy that, and subject to create conditions. We recommend and it is advisable do not. If a schedule uses ambiguous wording, ask for it in writing before inception, and keep the reply.
Agree only to conditions the household will actually keep. A condition accepted at inception and quietly ignored from the second week is worse than a higher premium, because it converts a covered loss into an uncovered one.
Safes: rating, size and fixing
Safes are rated to European standards, and each rating carries two figures: a cash sum and a valuables sum, the latter typically ten times the former. Underwriters read the valuables figure, and the working rule is that it should be at or above the total agreed value of everything kept inside.
Three points cause more trouble than the rating itself:
- Anchoring. A safe below a stated weight — often around 1,000 kg — must be bolted into structure, floor or wall, using the manufacturer’s fixings. An unanchored safe is portable, and thieves treat it as luggage. Some insurers require evidence of installation.
- Location. A safe visible on arrival, or in a garage or outbuilding, may be rated differently from one within the secured envelope of the house. Behind a locked door within an alarmed zone is what underwriters expect.
- Keys and codes. Conditions routinely require that keys are not left on the premises when it is unoccupied and that codes are not written down near the safe. Who holds them — including staff and cleaners — may need declaring.
The condition attached to the safe usually specifies when items must be inside it: scheduled pieces above a stated figure whenever not being worn, or whenever the property is unoccupied overnight. That second formulation is the one households breach without noticing.
Unsure whether your safe meets the rating on your schedule?
Send us the make, model and what it holds; we will tell you where you stand.
Alarms: grade, coverage and monitoring
Intruder alarms are specified by grade, and grade rises with the value at risk. Above modest sums an underwriter will want a professionally installed system rather than a self-fitted one, with a maintenance contract in place.
Coverage matters as much as grade. A system that protects the ground floor but not the room holding the collection satisfies nobody, and conditions increasingly specify which areas must be covered and by what — perimeter contacts, internal movement detection, and separate protection for a strongroom or display area.
Monitoring is the usual dividing line. Below a threshold, a self-monitored system sending alerts to a phone is accepted. Above it, connection to a central station is required, sometimes a named or approved one, with a documented response protocol. In Portugal, response times vary considerably between urban and rural addresses, and an isolated quinta in the interior will attract stricter requirements than an apartment in Lisbon precisely because the response is slower.
Two conditions attach to almost every alarm requirement: that the system is set whenever the property is unoccupied, and that the insurer is notified if it is out of service for more than a stated period. Building work is where the second one gets breached.
Doors, glazing and the rest of the physical envelope
Beyond safes and alarms, surveys look at the building. Expect attention to door construction and locking — multi-point locking on final exit doors is a common requirement — and to glazing, since a great many Portuguese houses are built around large sliding glazed panels onto a terrace. Laminated glass, key-operated locks on sliding panels, and grilles or shutters on vulnerable openings all appear in conditions.
Perimeter matters at rural and coastal properties: gates, fencing, external lighting, cameras, and whether anyone is on site. Where a property is regularly empty, the unoccupancy clause interacts with all of this, and often imposes additional requirements — water turned off, a keyholder visiting at stated intervals, valuables removed to a bank — after a set number of consecutive days.
The underwriter survey
Above certain values a survey is a condition of quoting. A surveyor visits, records construction, fire protection, security and how the valuables are actually held, and the report produces the schedule of conditions. Anything they call a risk requirement generally has to be completed within a stated period, and cover may be conditional on it.
The survey is worth engaging with rather than tolerating, for a practical reason: requirements are negotiable while they are being drafted and effectively fixed afterwards. If a requirement is impractical — a listed building where the required locking cannot be fitted, a heritage façade that will not take shutters — that is the moment to say so and agree an alternative. How this fits into the wider placement process is set out in how a specialist risk is placed.
Keeping the conditions true
Conditions describe a state of affairs the insurer has priced. When the state of affairs changes, the description has to change with it. Notify a new safe or an upgraded alarm, because it may reduce the premium. Notify a lapsed monitoring contract, a system decommissioned during renovation, an extended absence, or valuables moved to another address — because each of those, undeclared, is a live breach waiting for a burglary to expose it.
Adler & Rochefort is a commercial brand of Ownizo, Unipessoal Lda., registered with the Portuguese Insurance and Pension Funds Supervisory Authority (ASF) under no. 425591790/3. General information only, not personalised advice; cover, sub-limits and conditions vary by underwriter and by risk.
More on this subject: Liberty Mutual home insurance in Portugal: the specialist route