E-bike insurance in New Zealand - Home contents vs specialty bike insurance?

Should I insure my e-bike in Auckland?

Insurance is highly recommended for e-bike owners in Auckland. Although we advocate prevention over a cure in the case of bike theft, there is absolutely no doubt that insurance has helped a concerning number of our customers in the past decade to keep using e-bikes in Auckland after theft. 

The good news for anyone in New Zealand is that insuring your e-bike is much cheaper than most places in the world. 

The dominant method for insuring an e-bike is through home contents insurance. At time of writing, there are zero providers of specialty e-bike insurance in this country. 

How do I insure my e-bike through home contents?

If you already have contents insurance then your e-bike is probably covered right now and in most cases at no additional cost to your premiums. It would be wise to check the details of your excess and claim limits and to inform your insurer of the e-bike(s) you own. 

If you do not have contents insurance and would like to insure your e-bike, then we would recommend you seek out a contents policy. Please note that this does not require you to own a home or even to insure your home - it is the contents part of the 'home contents' insurance that is relevant. 

Even if you don't feel like you have a need for insurance for anything other than your e-bike(s), it is still the most cost effective and practical way to get any type of insurance. Consider the coverage that it gives you for any other possessions as a bonus. Contents insurance is usually very generous in scope too - it often covers liabilities for e-bikes (and other goods) that you don't own such as one you borrow from a friend. Typically it will cover an e-bike even if you didn't even lock it, which isn't the case with specialty bike insurance products.

How much will it cost to insure my e-bike?

We can't really say exactly how much it will be, as it will be a policy to cover all of your household possessions. The insurers will take into account their value and their risk based on your living arrangements and other demographics. Anecdotally we can say that the total cost for contents insurance policies are often similar to the cost of insuring a single e-bike overseas. It becomes particularly good value when there are multiple e-bikes in the house, as the cost of the policy doesn't go up much or at all when extra e-bikes are added into the house. And for those who already have contents insurance, most report that having added an e-bike to it didn't cost them anything, so it feels like free insurance to them. 

Do you have any insurance companies you recommend?

Not really any particular picks. However, I would ask if the policies are 'replacement value' or 'market value'. Replacement value is more desirable, as it puts the onus on the insurance company to find and fund a suitable replacement for your stolen e-bike. Market value policy claims start with establishing the second hand value of your e-bike at the time it was stolen. In other words, they start with an argument, which is not what you want when making a claim.

I've never had insurance before, I'm renting a house and having trouble starting/getting coverage. Any advice?

Yes! First is to just accept that contents insurance is the path. Second is to get quotes from insurance companies asking for contents insurance like any normal (non bike-obsessed) person would, to the extent that I don't recommend you even mention your electric bike until you've got the insurance policy. Why? Because many people report talking the insurance company out of giving them a content policy because they focus in on the e-bike and nothing else. I admire that so many people consider their e-bike the only material possession they care about but this won't make it easy for anyone to assess you - and if this is your first time getting insurance, you need to make it easy for them. A common reason why the "I've only got an e-bike, a laptop, phone and some old clothes" approach derails the process is that the insurance representative doesn't always know all the rules and if you keep talking about your e-bike, they will look up 'e-bike insurance' which I can guarantee they do not offer, so they'll think they need to refer you to the vehicles team (who also don't offer it), or they'll recommend you contact a specialist insurer which is code for "this person is hard work, I want to go to lunch". The more you follow what a 'normal' person would do when seeking contents insurance, the easier it'll be for you and the poor person on the other end of the phone/form. You might have a guitar you're fond of but they don't really care about that either - get yourself insured for all your stuff. If they ask what you own you can tell them at that point. Most likely they only want a total figure for all your treasures and a figure for the single most expensive item in any given category (e-bikes fall under sports equipment for insurance purposes). There are common insurance thresholds that might result in higher premiums and/or larger excesses, eg $3,000, $5,000 etc. 

Is it cheaper to insure an e-bike in New Zealand than overseas? Why?

Check out this article on e-bike running costs in London. Insurance for a Riese and Muller Tinker (NZD8,000 rrp) is estimated at £30-£39/month or around NZD1,000 per year!

I personally pay less than half that for contents insurance in my home which covers all 4 of our e-bikes (not to mention our laptops, phones and old clothes).

Sure, London is an expensive place and the R&M Tinker is not a cheap bike. But when I was selling e-bikes in Sydney in the 2010s, an AUD3000 RRP e-bike cost AUD180/year to insure and was not eligible for cover under a home contents policy. I expect that cost has risen in the 15 years since. 

Why is it cheaper here? In my personal view it is a loop hole - the insurance companies have not got around to dealing with a category that surely is costing them much more than they are collecting in premiums. However, I've been saying for almost 10 years now that this situation won't last and yet here we are. I suppose there has always been another cyclone or flood to take the focus away from e-bikes.

What about specialty e-bike insurance?

First of all, I can't see why you would want to do that when we are still enjoying the situation described above. But in any case, the answer is that there aren't any. 

Some years ago Revolution Insurance offered a specialty e-bike product at reasonable rates - closer to the Sydney example than the London one for a modest e-bike. It was a fairly popular option for people who had never had contents insurance before, even though in my view it was not as good value for money. However, in 2024 they stopped their offer. Perhaps it will come back. 

Then there was Sundays Insurance, an Australian bike insurance company who entered the NZ market a couple years after the home grown Revolution Insurance. Sundays' offering didn't last long: