Please note: this is a translation of a German legal text. In case of doubt the German version applies.
Dear customer,
the statutory provisions on insurance contract law oblige us to draw your attention to your duties once an insured event has occurred.
Duties to inform and explain, submission of documents
You must do what you can to avert and reduce the loss. In doing so, the insurer's instructions are to be followed as far as it is reasonable for you.
To deal with a claim reported to us we need your cooperation. You are therefore obliged to give us detailed, truthful and timely reports of the loss and to support us in investigating and settling it. All circumstances that in our view are important for handling the claim must be communicated to us, and all documents and records requested for that purpose must be sent to us in good time. That applies in particular to the list of stolen items under item 25 of the claim form for burglary, robbery and theft, which we ask you to send without delay both to us as your insurer and to the responsible police station.
Loss of cover
Please note the statutory provisions on the legal consequences of breaching your duties to report, to inform and to explain. Under those provisions you lose your claim to cover if you breach your obligations intentionally, in particular if you intentionally give us no information or untrue information or fail to provide the records and evidence requested.
Where these obligations are breached through gross negligence, we are entitled to reduce our payment in proportion to the seriousness of your fault, which may extend to a complete loss of the claim. No reduction is made if you prove to us that you did not breach the obligation through gross negligence.
Even where your obligations have been breached we remain obliged to pay if you prove to us that the intentional or grossly negligent breach was causal neither for establishing the insured event nor for establishing the existence or the extent of our liability to pay. Please note that we are free from any liability to pay in every case where you have breached the obligations fraudulently.
Where the right to the benefit belongs not to you but to a third party, that third party is likewise obliged to provide complete and truthful information, explanation and documents.
If in doubt, report early
If you are unsure whether an event is insured at all, report it anyway. A report that turns out to be unnecessary costs nothing. A late report, by contrast, can put your claim at risk. You will find all forms and ways of contacting us under report your claim.
Questions about your claim?
We will tell you which documents the insurer needs and which deadlines apply to you.