A WEST Huntspill resident was stunned after his home contents insurance premium came in 28 times higher than his last one as his home has been deemed to be at “high risk” of flooding.

John Bowden was quoted an eyewatering £6,144.42 when he received his home contents insurance renewal documents recently – up from just £220.18 the year before.

He took the documents to his local branch of Lloyds Bank where a staff member was also taken aback by the astronomical price.

It turned out the Legal & General quote was correct because they believed Mr Bowden now lived in an area at “high risk” of flooding.

John, 63, said: “It was astonishing.

We’re deemed to be high risk, but it hasn’t flooded here for 35 years and even then it was nothing like the floods on the Levels.

“We’re no more at risk of flooding than any other place in the UK.”

“My concern is that if Lloyds have said they effectively won’t take our business next year more insurance providers might say they won’t risk insuring us either – it will just become a vicious circle.”

In a statement, Legal & General told the Mercury: “When calculating premiums for our policies we utilise a combination of our claims experience in each postcode area as well as comprehensive geographical information collected from various external agencies.”

Bridgwater MP Ian Liddell-Grainger said there are ways the Government can help in cases where insurance premiums become unaffordable because of flooding risk.

“This is exactly what we expected after the floods,” he said.

“I encourage anyone with a case like this to contact my office because we can help and I take each case seriously.

“Each case we get is passed to the Association of British Insurers.”

Since May this year the ABI has worked on a new scheme to help people who see their home and contents insurance premiums soar as a result of flooding in their area.

From next year, the new Flood Re scheme is set to ensure that domestic properties at highest risk of flooding receive affordable cover for the flood element of their insurance.

The plan will see that insurers sell insurance in the normal way with an incentive to compete for the business of customers with high flood risk because they know they can pass the flood element of the policy into the scheme.

The flood element of an insurance policy will be placed within the scheme and bases the price on a property’s council tax band.

Insurers will be able to use this facility to help cover an estimated 350,000 homes whose owners will struggle to find affordable cover.

If they are flooded these customers will deal with their insurer in the usual way to get their claim paid, and the Flood Re scheme will reimburse the insurer for the cost.