Does Home Insurance Cover Utility Lines?

Your home insurance policy covers many parts of your home against a wide range of risks, but does your home policy cover utility lines? Power lines, sewer lines, water lines, and other connections to municipal or utility services run from your home to an external connector. Most home insurance policies don’t cover these utility lines, but some insurers offer an add-on that allows coverage for certain risks to lines.

Service Line Coverage, also sometimes called Buried Utility (BU) Coverage, extends coverage beyond the walls of your home, protecting against losses to buried utility lines and service lines that make modern life possible. In many cases, the homeowner is responsible for the failure of these lines that occurs between the home and the connector at the street. Repair or replacement can cost thousands, depending on the type of damage, where the lines are damaged, the labor required for digging, etc.

Service line coverage is an endorsement available on some policies, but not all insurers offer the coverage. In this context, an endorsement is an add-on that changes how your policy coverage applies.

Like other parts of your policy, your service line coverage comes with some exclusions, which means there are some risks for which coverage is not provided by the policy. For example, a service line endorsement may exclude coverage for wells or fuel tanks. Earth movement or other specific perils may also be excluded.

However, the add-on can bring some valuable coverages, including:

– Wear and tear
– Freezing
– Mechanical breakdown
– Weight of equipment or people
– Artificially generated electrical current (surges)

If available through your insurer, service line coverage can be surprisingly affordable and potentially save you thousands of dollars if you have a covered loss. Like most parts of a home, utility lines aren’t designed to last forever. The right coverage can save the day if the utility lines to and from your home become damaged.