Finland has seen an unusual amount of heavy rain and storms this autumn, prompting some insurance firms to tighten their rules about payouts for weather-related damage.
However, the amount of damage caused by this season's storms has still been reasonable compared to previous years, according to Maarika Vauhkonen, claims manager at insurance firm LähiTapiola.
"There have been more autumn storms than in previous years, which means there's been more damage, but we've managed to avoid major damage," Vauhkonen said.
Sini Kujala, who works as the claims manager at another insurance company, Pohjola, said that there have been some autumn storms this year, but not particularly more than in previous years.
"Damage is likely to occur whenever a large tree falls on a building. At this stage it is difficult to say in terms of euros how much damage the recent storms have caused," Kujala explained.
Rain damage alone not enough
The claims managers of both companies said that the most common damage caused by storms and heavy rain include fallen trees, personal property blown away by hard winds, damage from leaky freezers that thaw out during power outages, as well as flooding cellars.
It is relatively difficult for insurance customers to get payouts for rain-related claims, however.
According to Vauhkonen, LähiTapiola only pays out for rain damage claims if it has rained 30 mm within an hour — or 70 mm over the course of a day — in the affected area.
Meanwhile, Pohjola does not have specific criteria about rainfall amounts, but a condition for rain-related building damage claims stipulates that rainwater must have penetrated structures at the ground level.
It is more common for insurance companies to pay compensation for storm, rather than heavy rain damage, according to Jussi Korpelainen, the insurance and financial advisory sector chief at the Finnish Financial Ombudsman Bureau (Fine).
"Typically, insurance policy terms are structured so that damage caused by rain is not covered, but [claims about] damage that's been caused by flooding from exceptional torrential rains are compensated," Korpelainen said.
Users with an Yle ID can leave comments on our news stories. You can create your Yle ID via this link. Our guidelines on commenting and moderation are explained in this article. You can comment on this article until 23:00 on 18 October.