Caravan insurance after hail damage

+1 for Shannons.
They insure repairable write offs all the time.
Who's going to junk an Allard just because of a bit of body damage...

Thanks Phil and Malcolm. I'll respond also to Baz below with a bit more of the story. As Phil resides in the ACT, he may also know that it costs a bit to get the van re-registered because it is less than 15 years old and therefore subject to the processes designed to stop people re-birthing write-offs. What a pity it wasn't two years older!
Cheers, Keir VK1KKM

Shannons wont insure caravans.I tried
Try Ken Tame & associates

Baz - your guess is spot on (nearly). The van was assessed today (after my first post) as a repairable write-off, but the process to establish its write-off value is a little more convoluted. The photos and assessment report will go to a major auction house who will offer it on the web. Once that process has finished we will be asked if we want to buy it back matching the highest offer. At that point we will know its market value given the damage.
The van is in a road-worthy condition, it is only hail damage to the roof, and it only has to pass a normal roadworthy test for it to be re-registered. SWMBO is not comfortable to have an asset on the road without insurance so I'd have trouble pursuing that avenue (funny about that, we have different risk profiles for our super lump sums too!). Hence the initial question.
The good news is I rang APIA today and they will do comprehensive insurance (less hail damage) coverage for the depreciated market value of the damaged van. My other thought was CIL, but I haven't rung them yet.

Shop around a bit more and try ammi and suncorp. Suncorp own a heap of companies and they all work independently, so you get different prices and policies.

Here are the Suncorp companies. http://www.suncorpgroup.com.au/about-us/what-we-do/our-brands

9900Eagle is quite right. Suncorp has several coys including all the ones referred to thus far. i.e. AAMI, APIA, Shannons, CIL. Yes they all operate independently but CIL is the specialist caravan and camper insurer. There is no third party risk as such - that sits with the towing vehicle. The only exposure you have is for the residual value after determining the salvage or auction value. That is the most you can lose. Until that is determined the insurance equation is unknown. I would have trouble justifying a premium of a few hundred with an excess of a few hundred for something with a nominal value of $1500 for example. If you are being asked for a premium of more than 5% of what it owes you it isn't worth it.

I think this is being made to sound harder than it is.
"Repairable write off" simply means not economic for the insurer to repair and does not mean there is anything really wrong with it. or it would be a statutory write off.

Re-registration is simply a case of gaining an engineering blue slip and then pink and rego. Its a no brainer simple process.
The insurance also should be no problem. Its a case of agreeing a value and that value does not have to be less than what you want. Shannons will insure it for a million dollars provided you are happy to pay the premium.
The bigger companies are only interested in low risk, hi volume sales which require no human involvment
If all you have is hail dents on the roof, who cares - leave them there and save your money. Whose going to see it.

Hi Malcolm, the process of re-registering a repairable write off in the ACT (at least) is a bit convoluted and expensive. Firstly we have to buy back the van from the insurer at the agreed price, and then get a permit to drive it on the road for a day as it is automatically de-registered when put on the write-off register. On that day, I have to take it to the ACT Motor Registry and have a full roadworthy inspection, and once that is passed, I then have to pay for a vehicle identity check ($542) and supply a whole load of documentation relating to the complete history of the van since new (this is to prevent re-birthing of vehicles on the write-off register). I also have to get them to accept that none of the damage affects the roadworthiness, safety or integrity of the van, ie the damaged roof must not leak. Once this is all sorted out, I then have to present the vehicle for registration and pay stamp duty, as I have just purchased it from the insurance company. So yes, it is simple, provided the vehicle is roadworthy, the paperwork is in order, and the inspector decides that the damage does not affect the integrity of the van.
As you say, none of the bigger insurance companies is interested in insuring a hail-damaged van, but some of the smaller ones will. I'm happy to leave the dents there, but there is the (small) risk of the van becoming detached from the vehicle and causing damage to another vehicle; such an occurence is apparently not covered by the tug insurance, so I'd like to have separate comprehensive insurance on the van if possible.

Wow, bit more mucking about than NSW which is surprising.
Hop no one else bids it up for you.

Is there no way that the insurance co will sell it "as is where is" but not put it on the write off register?

It's our fault for living in the Nazi bureaucracy state!!!! Unfortunately, the insurance co. won't sell it on an "as is, where is" basis because they have no accurate way of assessing the market value of the hail-damaged asset, so their policy is to go through the auction route. In the old days, they'd take the van away to an auction house and you'd have to go to the auction house to win the bidding process and buy it back, but that costs the insurance company tow truck fees, so these days, they leave the van with you (and therefore we can leave all our stuff in it) and the photos and damage assessment report are put on the interwebby thing for everyone to bid. Then we can chose to match the highest bid and buy the van back, or empty the van of our stuff, and take the insurance payout.
Hence, the van has been declaired a repairable write-off, the rego cancelled, and it moves to the Write-off Register.
I'm often annoyed with Exploroz threads where the OP never gets back and finalises the story, so I'll try to post at the end of this saga and tell everyone the conclusion.

Keir & Marg,

I fear you have been misinformed in relation to the statement "but there is the (small) risk of the van becoming detached from the vehicle and causing damage to another vehicle; such an occurence is apparently not covered by the tug insurance". In my experience the "tug" policy does indeed provide cover under the third party section for trailers, caravans and the like becoming detached. Even if you only had a limited policy on the tug it would still pick up this aspect. You really only need insurance on the van for accidental damage, fire and the like.

In Victoria you don't need a VIV for hail damaged vehicles to reregister them, I think the same applies for some other States as well.

What is a VIV? The OP is in the ACT so what you are posting does not apply to him.

Vehicle Identity Validation.
A VIV certificate is a document issued by a VicRoads VIV Inspector after inspection of the vehicle. It certifies that the identity of a repairable write-off is: that of the previously damaged vehicle and not that of a re-birthed stolen vehicle.
Maybe he is in the ACT, my advice about Victoria was to alert him to check if the same applies in his State, or would you rather I did his homework for him!
I don't see anywhere where it says that the OP is in the ACT.

If you read the above you will see that is precisely what he is contemplating. He asked for suggestions from others who have insured hail damaged vans but none have come forth. He has however received some useful leads from others. If you read carefully you will see there are a few hoops for him to jump through before he can regain ownership of the van. When an insurance company writes a van off and pays out then the ownership of the van belongs to them, not the original owner.

I meant why bother with insurance Just keep it and use it as it is if its only dented.

My Sons car got hit in Brisbane storms but we arent going to do anything as its not really worth it.

I know what happens as have bought cars like that for parts

Good stuff, please let us know how it all goes!

OK, as of today's date, the van has been written off by the NRMA and placed on the Written Off Vehicle Register in the ACT. Last week I took it for a registration inspection (which it passed, all OK). The NRMA has cancelled the insurance, and paid us out. We have purchased the written-off van from them. I have today re-insured the Penguin with APIA, one of the few companies that will insure hail-damaged vans, and, notwithstanding the hail damage, they have insured the Penguin at their estimate of market value (about $3500 less than the NRMA). APIA annual insurance is marginally cheaper than the NRMA.
Next week, I take the van to the ACT Motor Registry for its Vehicle Identity Inspection, which takes about 1.5 hours and involves a fee of $542.80.
So, assuming we pass the inspection, we will be back in business and all legal next week. The dents in the roof won't be fixed, but I will be fixing the roof hatch, the rubber mouldings in the roof tracks, and the damaged lower fridge vent, total cost about $200.
Seeing the size of the payout, SWMBO is planning an overseas holiday!!!

My last post on this subject with the final result (and a pleasant surprise!) I took the van to the inspection station today for its identity inspection so that it could be removed from the Write-off Register. There are two types of inspection in the ACT, a "complex" one (for which I was quoted $542:80) and this was what the inspection people had booked me in for; the other inspection is a "simple" one. The "complex" one is when the written-off vehicle has changed hands in the process and has a new owner after being written-off. If the vehicle remains in the same ownership, it only has to have a "simple" identity check, $52. Yippee. We are now all legal again, and my bank account is healthier than I thought it would be.

Sometimes you get the win, take it while you can!!!

Good work, worth the effort.