Scorching Damage (Sengschaden)
Scorching damage is heat damage to property without open flame, treated differently from fire damage in property insurance and regularly excluded from standard cover.
Concept
Scorching damage arises from heat exposure to an object without the occurrence of open flame – that is, without fire in the insurance sense – typical examples being clothing burned by an iron or a pot scorched on a stove hotplate. The decisive criterion distinguishing scorching damage from fire damage is therefore not the temperature involved, but the absence of open flame.
Distinction from Fire Damage
Because fire insurance typically covers only losses caused by fire, lightning strike, explosion, and aircraft crash, pure scorching damage without accompanying ignition is regularly excluded from the standard scope of fire and building insurance; this applies even where the heat exposure was caused by a fire, as long as the affected object itself did not catch open flame.
Practical Relevance
In household contents insurance, scorching damage is frequently offered as a separate add-on module that can be included for an additional premium, since comparable everyday incidents – for example caused by cigarettes, candles, or household appliances – occur relatively frequently, even though they do not qualify as fire damage under insurance law and would therefore remain uncovered without an explicit inclusion agreement.