Harvey Jones has changed his mind about boiler insurance.
All insurance feels like money down the drain until the time comes when you actually need to make a claim.
I have grudgingly accepted the arguments in favour of motor insurance (it's compulsory), buildings cover (my biggest asset), household contents (everything I own) and life insurance (I have many enemies).
I have even accepted the case for critical illness cover, particularly after it delivered financial salvation by helping my father-in-law clear his debts after illness forced him to retire early.
But plenty of policies look like they have been dreamed up by insurance companies solely to suck coins and notes out of the pockets of credulous customers. Examples include identity theft cover, mobile phone cover, credit card protection, extended warranties and payment protection insurance (PPI), to name but a few.
I have always placed home emergency cover, also known as boiler breakdown cover, firmly in this category. But now I've had to rethink.
Festive fear
Home emergency plans offer protection against domestic disasters such as frozen pipes or packed up boilers, and are routinely given a hard sell at this time of year. As is the way with insurance company ads, their pitch involves summoning up a statistically unlikely fear, then claiming their policy supplies the solution (for only a few pounds a month).
In this case, it usually involves your heating system packing up at Christmas, leaving you with a house full of shivering relatives lighting candles for warmth and entertainment, or your electrics exploding, instantly rotting the contents of your freezer, turkey and all.
Home emergency plans promise to save the day by guaranteeing to dispatch a qualified tradesmen to your house, even at peak festive periods, ensuring that the kids can watch Harry Potter and Grandma doesn't freeze to her chair.
These plans cost anything from £100 to £250 a year, which always seemed a lot to pay on the off chance that festive disaster might strike.
Then a couple of weeks ago, a phone call from my parents forced me to reconsider. Their gas boiler had packed up.
My parents are both in their 70s, and their creaking, cold-averse bodies didn't take kindly to the sudden drop in temperature, as the sub-tropical warmth of their over-heated house gave way to Arctic conditions. Rather like being transplanted from New Delhi in the hot season to Helsinki right about now.
And to make matters worse, it was actually snowing. In north London, in November. The whole scenario was an insurance company marketing director's dream.
"I'm just glad it didn't happen at Christmas," my mother said, and now it really was beginning to sound like an ad for home emergency plans.
No turkey
I was amazed to discover they had been paying a couple of hundred pounds a year to British Gas for just such an emergency (they don't tell me anything these days).
And British Gas was rather good. Its tradesman came within 24 hours, as promised. He tried everything, ordering part after part, always returning next day to fix it at the promised time, and when the boiler proved beyond repair, gave my parents a new one free of charge.
They did have to endure two weeks without heating (British Gas gave them free fan heaters), but the service was astonishingly high throughout. British Gas only needed a little bit of chasing, when the repairs team handed over to the boiler replacement department.
Now I don't want this to turn into free advertising for British Gas, but my parents were pretty impressed. Once they'd defrosted.
All the trimmings
British Gas aren't the only ones to offer these plans, Direct Line, Homeserve, Home Call Plus, Lloyds TSB and Norwich Union do also.
All plans differ slightly. Direct Line's Home Response 24 offers unlimited call-outs 365 days a year, all carried out by vetted and qualified tradesmen. Any repairs are guaranteed for 12 months. Your premiums depend on where you live, when your house was built, how big it is, how many people live there and the age of your boiler, but you can typically expect to pay around £100 a year.
Homeserve takes the concept too far with a bewildering range of plans for plumbing and drains, boilers and heaters, appliances, electrical emergencies and pest infestation. What kind of crazy is going to pay £47.88 a year for shower breakdown cover?
At £95.40 a year, Norwich Union's Home Emergency Cover is simpler and more affordable. If you already have Norwich Union's home insurance, you pay £54 a year.
This gives you cover for blocked drains and burst pipes, loss of hot water, heating, gas or electricity, loss of house keys, and any broken or damaged windows and doors that pose a security risk.
Winter cheer
Before rushing to sign up, confirm that get you can still get cover in time for that fateful Christmas period. Many policies don't allow you to claim for the first 14 or 30 days after signing up.
You should also check the small print carefully for exclusions and maximum cover limits. On some policies, my parents would have had to pay for their new boiler themselves.
So would I buy a plan? Despite recent experience, my answer would have to be no, even though my boiler isn't exactly fresh out of the box. I've got too many other calls on my pocket.
In any case, I'm spending Christmas at my parents. And they've got a nice new toasty heating system, with guarantees.