When insurance claims are the disaster

Sunday, 26 October 2025

OPINION: In early 2023, New Zealand experienced multiple consecutive severe weather events. The Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods and Cyclone Gabrielle were so severe that there was loss of life.

These events had significant impacts on many communities in the upper North Island. Unfortunately, for some of those impacted the disaster will continue to affect them as they work through their insurance claims.

These events resulted in more than 100,000 insurance claims, totalling nearly $4 billion dollars. From the Canterbury earthquake experience we know it is likely that some of these claims have caused people significant stress. We also know from stories in New Zealand and research in Australia that for many of those impacted by the disaster, dealing with insurance disputes can be as bad as, or even worse than, the actual event.

Any type of engagement with legal processes can be distressing, but it can be much harder in a post-disaster context. People have to navigate sometimes confusing, legalistic, formal processes, which may be expensive if they need to engage lawyers and put their claims through the courts, all while they are still recovering from the trauma of the disaster they experienced.

Often, these claims are for homes or tied to people’s livelihoods, meaning they sometimes cannot move on physically and psychologically from the disaster until the dispute is resolved.

Some insurance claims from the Canterbury earthquakes took more than a decade to resolve. The sheer number, and in some cases the complexity, of the disputes meant resolving them took a long time. Claimants often ended up in disputes over the amount of their payout, requirements to prove damage, or delays with or denials of their claims. Many processes have changed and improved since then, but we believe there is still much to learn from the experiences of people impacted by the severe weather and cyclone events in Auckland and Hawke’s Bay. Have the changes and improvements made for a better experience for those disputing insurance claims in these regions?

For our research, we would like to hear from anyone who has disputed an insurance claim following a disaster event, including the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods and Cyclone Gabrielle.

We’re also interested in hearing about different dispute resolution processes, especially those who went through the insurer’s own dispute resolution service, the Ombudsman, private services, the New Zealand Claims Resolution Service, Tribunals, or the Courts. Both bad and good experiences are useful, because we will listen to your stories and your experiences to understand what would make the experience a better one for claimants. We will use what we learn from you to make recommendations to the Government and other stakeholders to improve the process for New Zealanders in the future.

Anyone who is at least 16 years old and has disputed an insurance claim for disaster-related damage in New Zealand can participate in our survey at bit.ly/InsuranceDispute

Dr Lauren Vinnell is a Senior Lecturer of Emergency Management at the Joint Centre for Disaster Research at Massey University, with expertise in post-disaster psychological wellbeing. Dr Toni Collins is an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Canterbury and has experience researching the impact of disaster on New Zealanders from a legal perspective. This research is funded by Te Hiranga Rū QuakeCoRE, a Tertiary Education Commission-funded Centre of Research Excellence.