For US residents, former insurance agent and longtime cycling enthusiast Josh Putnam has posted some information about what types of insurance cover bicycle loss, and at what level. Some of the information is rather sobering. For example, he states...
"The default for many policies is to pay Actual Cash Value (ACV) for personal property. ACV is, loosely speaking, what the item is actually worth given its age. A ten year old bicycle, for example, would be valued at the cost of a new bicycle minus ten years' depreciation." For those of us with well-loved, pristine older bikes, this is a bit discouraging.
However, he goes on to say...
"Replacement cost coverage for personal property values an item at the actual cost of a new replacement item. That same ten year old bicycle would be valued at the cost of a new bicycle of similar quality."
Yet...
"But insurance generally does not pay the full value of the loss. Your policy will typically have a deductible, maybe $100, maybe $1000, depending on what you chose when you bought the policy."
Lots of good, thought-provoking information from Josh...
http://www.phred.org/~josh/bike/bike_insure.htmlBest,
Dan.