TORRUMBARRY dairy farmers Sally Mitchell and Barry Ashwin were shocked last October when their insurance bill rose almost $2000.
The rise - 25.4 per cent higher than the previous year - includes a 26.2 per cent rise in the base premium to cover their house and farm buildings and a 23 per cent rise in the fire services levy and takes the total to $9814.
"I would class our situation as medium-to-low fire risk and we're getting slugged just like somebody else who lives in the middle of a forest," she said.
The couple, whose herd includes 450 milkers and other young stock, has operated dairy farms in the area for more than 20 years.
One of their three properties has a tree-lined creek running through it, but most of the land has been cleared for pasture, which is constantly chewed down by stock.
"We've got paddocks right up to the creek," Ms Mitchell said.
"It's not as if there's a lot of dead grass and dry grass everywhere ... it's a dairy farm."
Cohuna insurance broker Ron Stanton said his clients were looking forward to the day the fire services levy was applied to local government rates instead of insurance premiums.
"It will be more fair and equitable," he said.
On the other side of the state at Lindenow in East Gippsland, Sue and Steve Campbell can see the Mitchell River in the distance.
But despite being on an escarpment and 18 metres above the river, their property has a flood overlay which is about to send their insurance premiums through the roof.
The Campbell's have known about the flood overlay for some time - they believed it was a result of a mapping anomaly - but they realised its significance recently when they asked insurer RACV for an updated home insurance quote.
The estimate for next financial year was $6430, seven times the $883 they paid last year.
The couple was shocked and Mr Campbell said it was ridiculous to think their house, which was well above the flats of the Mitchell River, would even be inundated.
