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Community Corner

Lawmakers Limit Use of Insurance Policy 'Hurricane Deductibles'

The new law would ban applying 'hurricane deductibles' for storms, like Irene last August, that had already been downgraded to tropical storms.

After many homes in and elsewhere in Connecticut were damaged by , that made property owners responsible for an extra portion of the repair costs even though the storm wasn’t rated as a hurricane.

The Hartford Courant reported that a new bill in Hartford that just passed the General Assembly House of Representatives unanimously would prohibit insurance companies from applying the hurricane deductible if a storm had been downgraded to a tropical storm when it hit Connecticut.

"We are now one step closer to protecting homeowners from insurance industry abuse," East Haven state Rep. , who serves as the chair of the is quoted in the article.

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While standard policy deductibles can make the policyholder responsible for the first $500 or $1,000 of coverage, hurricane deductibles are based on a percentage and might be as high as 5 percent.

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