Honey to offer home cover to BOQ customers in latest partnership

4 April 2022

Honey Insurance has won the rights to distribute its home and contents cover to Bank of Queensland’s (BOQ) 400,000 customers.

The new partnership with BOQ, which has more than 160 branches across Australia, comes after similar product distribution offers with McGrath, power firm AGL and homebuilder Metricon – all Honey investors.

Jamie McPhee, the former head of BOQ’s ME Bank, is also an investor in Honey.

“Honey continues to shake up the home insurance industry,” Honey CEO and Founder Richard Joffe said. “We knew from the first conversation with BOQ that both brands had a shared aspiration to digitally embed insurance into the banking experience for the 400,000 BOQ retail banking customers.”

Honey launched last year after securing $15.5 million in seed funding from underwriting partner RACQ.

It uses satellite and third-party data to set cover and supplies smart sensors to “proactively mitigate” common claims in the home such as theft, fire and water damage, granting customers a discount on their annual premium for the adoption of these devices.

“Honey is less than 12 months old and the announcement cements Honey’s aspirations to help Australians protect their homes through a tech-led offering, the first of its kind in Australia,” the insurtech said.

Other Honey investors include the founders of Afterpay, Airtasker and Zip, former Corelogic CEO Graham Mirabito and former News Corp Australia and Foxtel CEO Peter Tonagh, who is now Honey Chairman. The Honey platform is also available on the app of its investor PEXA.

“We’re really proud to be the only bank in Australia offering this to our customers and look forward to working together to make a difference to our customers’ insurance experience,” ME Bank CEO and BOQ Group Executive Retail Banking Martine Jager said. “It is the first of its kind in the Australian market.”