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Canal Boat Insurance – Compare Cheap Quotes

Canal boats are becoming an increasingly popular choice for recreational boating in the UK, with thousands of miles of British canals ensuring canal boat owners will always have somewhere to explore.

However, before someone can take their canal boat out on the UK’s inland waterways they will usually have to be issued with a waterways licence – and before they can apply for this licence they will usually have to take out canal boat insurance.

Of course, just because canal boat insurance is a mandatory requirement for canal boat owners doesn’t mean they should pay an arm and a leg for it. By using our boat insurance comparison system to compare canal boat insurance quotes they stand a better chance of finding the right policy at the right price.

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What’s the minimum level of insurance cover I need for my canal boat?

Most waterway authorities will require you to take our third party boat insurance at a bare minimum, and in most cases your third party canal boat insurance will need to provide at least £1 million of coverage (although the Canal & River Trust requires £2 million of coverage).

How much does canal boat insurance cost?

It’s difficult to predict how much you’re likely to have to pay to insure your canal boat, because boat insurance companies take a wide range of risk factors into consideration when they are calculating the premium. For instance, the type of canal boat you own, its estimated market value, its make and model, the year it was built, the type of engine it has, where you store or moor it and where you normally sail it can all affect the cost of insuring a canal boat.

The best plan is to use our price comparison service to compare boat insurance quotes from a range of different insurance companies, and then go with the one that offers the best coverage at the best price.

Does my canal boat have to pass some sort of MOT before I can take out canalboat insurance?

That will usually depend on how old your canal boat is.

If your vessel is more than 20 years old then most boat insurance specialists will require you to get a Boat Safety Scheme (BSS) examination certificate before they will insure your canal boat.

Newer canal boats that were built less than 20 years ago can sometimes be insured without a BSS examination certificate, although some owners still have their boat examined and certified anyway in order to make sure the vessel doesn’t have any structural issues.

Does canal boat insurance cover the contents of my boat?

That depends on the type of canal boat insurance policy you take out.

As the name suggests, third party canal boat insurance is designed to protect third parties when you take to the water, and as such it usually won’t pay out for damage to your own vessel or theft of your canal boat’s contents.

Some more comprehensive canal boat insurance policies might include contents cover as standard, but it’s also possible to add this type of your cover to a more basic boat insurance policy for a small fee.