Ecclesiastical Insurance has been named as the country's most trusted home insurance provider.

The Gloucester-based company retained its place at top of the Fairer Finance Home Insurance.

Independent consumer group Fairer Finance surveys around 20,000 UK banking and insurance customers throughout the year, asking them to rate their satisfaction.

Customers rate the firms on happiness and trust with Fairer Finance using records from the Financial Ombudsman Service to assess complaints handling and a combination of mystery shopping and policy document reviews to assess transparency.

Ecclesiastical has seen improvements in its scores in all four key areas measured with its overall customer experience score increasing by five per cent to 84 per cent - 10 per cent higher than closest rival Nationwide.

The insurer's customer happiness score also increased by five per cent to 84 per cent and was rated most trusted insurer, achieving an increase of four per cent to 85 per cent.

Group chief executive Mark Hews said: "I am thrilled to see that Ecclesiastical has remained at the top of the Fairer Finance league table for home insurance, and that we continue to have the happiest customers.

"We're a unique financial services group, owned by a charity, and our purpose is to contribute to the greater good of society.

"We are committed to being the most trusted financial services group in all of our markets, so it's wonderful to see significant improvement in all of our scores and to hear that our customers believe they can trust us ahead of 49 other insurers."

James Daley, managing director at Fairer Finance, said: "Ecclesiastical has been top of our home insurance customer experience ratings since it first appeared in our tables five years ago.

"What's most impressive is that it's continued to improve its scores across all elements of our ratings, and is not only top overall, but also has the happiest customers, most trusted brand and the best record on transparency.

"It now has a commanding lead over its competitors and is setting a new high bar for customer experience that I hope other insurers will aspire to."