How to save your family from a cold weekend – otherwise known as home emergency insurance!

Have you ever watched those superhero movies or television programmes where the hero performs some miraculous feat and saves the girl, or the world? Afterwards you fantasize about you being the superhero and everybody falling at your feet!

There is nothing wrong with daydreams; they are part of the human psyche, our way of dealing with the mundanity of our daily lives, but we can all be superheroes without realizing it. Sometimes having the foresight to be prepared for potential disaster can elevate us to this highest of highs!

Having the presence of mind to take out home emergency insurance turned me from boring old dad aimlessly plodding through life to comic book superhero at a stroke. Here is the plot!

I got one of those calls you get from your insurance company asking if you would like to take out home emergency insurance. I usually baulk at these calls and make some puerile excuse to say no, however, on this occasion I had just witnessed one of our neighbours having to move out of their house for a couple of days due to a water leak. So, on this occasion I said yes. There, I had taken the initiative and made a decision. I then did what all responsible dads do and forgot all about it.

I was awoken early one morning by an irate mob consisting of my two daughters and my wife. The heating was not working! There was no hot water and it was very cold. My mind was still coming to terms with the fury of their approach, when I remembered that policy. It was stuffed in my dressing table drawer! I found it and immediately called the emergency number. The engineer arrived within a seemingly very short time and sorted it out. It was the thermocouple in the boiler evidently.

From that moment I was the superhero in our house! Needless to say I milked it for all it was worth!