Property All Risks
Property all risks insurance covers unforeseen damage to or destruction of insured property from any peril that is not expressly excluded.
Comparison profile
- Trigger
- All risks
- Insured interest
- Physical property (buildings, contents, stock) owned or held in trust by the policyholder at the insured location.
- Rating basis
- Sum insured, Turnover, Building value, Location and construction class
- Typical limits
- Full-value or first-loss limits per location; layered international programmes often reach several hundred million CHF/EUR in total capacity.
- Typical deductibles
- Per-occurrence deductible, typically higher for natural catastrophe and machinery-related perils.
- Target segments
- SME, Industry, Multinational programmes
Insured events
- Fire and explosion
- Water damage
- Storm and hail
- Impact and collision
- Theft with forcible entry (where included)
Key exclusions
- War and nuclear energy
- Wear and tear, gradual deterioration
- Design and material defects
- Cyber losses without resulting physical damage
- Natural catastrophe exposure beyond agreed sublimits
Coverage principle
Unlike named-perils cover (fire, natural perils, etc.), all-risks cover reverses the burden of proof: any unforeseen, sudden physical damage is insured unless an exclusion applies. The insurer must prove the exclusion, not the insured the insured peril.
Typical exclusions
War, nuclear energy, intent, gradual wear and tear, defects in design and material (partially recoverable through engineering covers), cyber losses without physical damage and – depending on the market – natural catastrophe sublimits for exposed zones.
Programme design
In international programmes, the all-risks cover usually forms the master policy, complemented by local policies. Key design elements are sums insured and margins, deductible structure, sublimits and alignment with the business interruption cover.
Comparison and delineation
Property all risks is the market default for commercial property damage; a stand-alone named-perils policy (fire, allied perils only) is rarer today but still used where all-risks capacity is scarce or pricing prohibitive. It is regularly complemented by business interruption cover, which responds to the loss of gross profit following an insured property damage event, and by machinery breakdown cover, which insures mechanical and electrical breakdown perils that all-risks wordings typically exclude.