FloodFlash - flood insurance made easy

by Startacus Admin

Flood insurance for all thanks to innovative InsurTech startup FloodFlash

Flooding is an increasingly common problem. You don’t have to be in the middle of a tropical storm in the Caribbean to find yourself wading through waist-high water in the streets; a little bit of rain in the wrong part of England could have a similar effect.

Every year, flooding causes a massive $41 billion of uninsured losses. Sometimes local councils and government will foot the bill, but often small businesses and individuals - those least able to afford it - are left to fend for themselves. This can lead to shutting up shop and maybe moving house. Only, how can you move when no one will buy a house that’s continually flooded? So how do we go about getting better insurance for those at risk?

London-based InsurTech startup FloodFlash is using flexible, event-based insurance to try to put as much of those massive costs as possible back into the hands of those built to take it: insurance firms.

Event-based insurance means that an insurance payout will only be triggered if flooding reaches a certain level. By using event-based insurance, you stand to pay a lower premium, because there is less uncertainty for the underwriters.

The premium is, of course, based on the flood risk, which is determined using things like flood records, terrain data, rainfall records, and other sources. However, the insurance is somewhat flexible. You can further reduce your premium by choosing a lower settlement amount, if you think you wouldn’t need a higher amount to recover after a flood; and if you can build up your own flood defences, you can choose a higher flood level for the payout to trigger at.

The flood level is measured automatically by the sensor - designed by a former Dyson product designer - that is installed at the premises. With this self-contained sensor working automatically, and insurance payouts that usually arrive the same day, insurance is one less thing to worry about in the already-traumatic event of a flood.

Just recently, FloodFlash announced that they have raised £1.9m in seed funding from LocalGlobe, Pentech Ventures and InsurTech Gateway. The latter is the InsurTech incubator currently hosting the startup. With the aforementioned increase in the issue of flooding, insurance created specifically for those affected by the problem is particularly welcome as we approach that hothouse-Earth turning point.

Interested in insurtech? Read our recent articles on:

Wrisk - The InsurTech startup that's on a mission to make macroinsurance our insurance of choice.

Flock - offers on-demand insurance for drone pilots.

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• #finance
• #insurance
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• #flood
• #insurtech
• #floodflash

Published on: 19th August 2018