Making your own Motorhome and Campervan Insurance

Comfort Insurance should be an inspiration to many small or family-run businesses – where a passion was turned into a business, and that business became a leading industry specialist – recognised, respected and admired by the biggest brands in the sector.

Peter Cue and his wife Pat had always enjoyed being motorhome owners, seeing it as a cost-effective way to enjoy flexible family holidays. But they came to recognise that one aspect of their holiday routine that was far from ideal – insuring their vehicle and holiday.

Getting motorhome insurance or campervan insurance until the early 1990s was something of a lottery – apart from finding an insurer who was happy to cover such vehicles, there didn’t seem to be any consistency about the sort of cover the Cue’s could get. It really did require patience and persistence to find the right type of cover for the sort of holidays they’d come to enjoy.

But from adversity came inspiration – if nobody else was doing it Peter Cue decided that he would.

So, in 1992 Peter created specific motorhome insurance in conjunction with what was then Norwich Union, but is now the multinational insurance organisation Aviva plc, and set up shop as Comfort Insurance targeting motorhome owners.

“Back then I had a young family and we enjoyed regular holidays in our motorhome,” explained Peter, “But getting a decent level of cover was next to impossible. And I found that some of my friends were in exactly the same position. It was incredibly frustrating, so I decided I would do something about it.”

And because there hadn’t been a motorhome insurance specialist up until that point, the big insurers didn’t really understand enough about the sector to be able to offer the specific cover that owners really needed.

“It really was a challenge to find the right sort of cover.  For instance, it was difficult to find the sort of contents and personal effects cover that you really needed when you were on the road, because insurance companies didn’t really think about that sort of thing, they were really focused on their core markets. It was also pretty unheard of to have breakdown cover as an add-on for motorhomes, and realistic levels of overseas cover were a bit of a rarity too.”

“But Norwich Union were great, they recognised that there was a disconnect and were keen to do something about it, and the best people to develop the right sort of policies were people like us, motorhome owners.” explained Peter. “So we put together a range of proposals for policies – they looked at the numbers, liked what they saw, and were happy to underwrite us.”

From that secure base Comfort was able to grow and develop all sorts of other policies to cover campervans, caravans and all sorts of other specialist leisure vehicles. Today, Comfort Insurance has a strong and loyal customer base because one of the industry giants realised that allowing customers to ‘own’ their own market segment made great business sense.

“Aviva have always offered great support,” added Peter, “and even today they invite us to share our experiences with all parts of their business, speaking at various conferences and events. But really it was their decision to listen to us customers that was the real entrepreneurial moment, we just had the knowledge and the passion to make it happen.”