Students offered special cover

STUDENTS starting college this autumn are being offered a range of insurance packages against theft or damage to their possessions.

Endsleigh, which specialises in the student market, has frozen premiums for people living in halls of residence to pounds 27 for another year.

In private accommodation prices start at pounds 36, rising to pounds 79 for cover of pounds 2,000. This includes burst pipes or criminal damage and applies to student rooms, parents' homes or transit to and from college.

The policy also offers reimbursement of college fees and expenses in the event of injury and payment of pounds 5,000 each academic year on the death of parents or guardians providing financial support.

Computer cover, costing from pounds 13.50 for each pounds 500 of value, is available separately.

Harrison-Beaumont, a firm of brokers at Honiton, Devon, offers policies starting at pounds 29.50 for up to pounds 2,000 worth of cover. Students in London, Manchester and some parts of Nottingham pay pounds 84 a year for the same policy.

Parts of Newcastle, Leeds, Teesside, Wolverhampton, Birmingham and Liverpool, seen as high-risk areas, cost pounds 225 a year.

Berkeley Alexander, of Lewes, Sussex, charges pounds 150 a year for pounds 2,000 worth of cover in Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Leeds and Sunderland. This falls to pounds 96 for Birmingham, Glasgow, Cardiff, London and Bristol and pounds 44 or less elsewhere.

Stand-alone computer cover is available from Academics' Computer Insurance Scheme. Undergraduates pay pounds 138.50 for fire and theft cover up to pounds 1,500. Post-graduates pay pounds 107.65.

Discounts on all bar the Endsleigh policy are available through Alan Broad Insurance Consultants in Oxford, specialists in student cover.

Churchill Insurance, the telephone insurer, also offers cheap cover, as low as pounds 71 for a 25-year-old couple in a two- bed house in Bristol city centre. But the cover is only available for people who have a close relationship, such as family members or couples, thus excluding typical student house-sharing set-ups.