Those decorative lights you haul out of storage every year to brighten up your home for the holidays can do more than promote holiday cheer. According to the National Fire Protection Association, each year holiday 
decorations and Christmas trees account for almost 2,000 fires and cause more than $41 million in property damage.
QBE Regional Insurance Senior Vice President Charles Valinotti recommends giving holiday lights special attention before, during and after the season’s celebrations. Here are tips to keep holiday lights shining brightly—and safely—throughout the season:
Conduct a pre-season review. Valinotti says before putting up the lights, inspect them for frayed wires, bare spots, insulation gaps, broken or cracked sockets and excessive kinking or wear. Use only lights tested and approved by an independent agency such as Underwriters Laboratories, which is noted on the packaging. And consider investing in light emitting diode (LED) lights that aren’t combustible and are more energy efficient than other types.
Celebrate safely with holiday lights. “The last thing anyone wants to experience during the holidays is a fire,” Valinotti says. He warns against linking more than three light strands together unless the directions say it’s safe to do so, and recommends connecting light strings to an extension cord before plugging them into an outlet. These precautions will help you avoid what happened to one QBE Regional customer who decorated a holiday tree using 1,300 lights powered by five plugs inserted into a single strip on one circuit. The resulting fire caused nearly $300,000 in damage.
Wrap up the holiday lighting season. Before packing up decorations for the season, re-inspect and discard broken or faulty lights. “To save you time next year, separate outdoor from indoor lights and label them,” Valinotti suggests. “And always store lights and other decorations away from kids, pets and water.”
If you’re among those keep holiday lights up year-round, especially outdoors, you should re-think this practice. Wires exposed to the elements all year long could pose a constant threat of electrical shock or fire. “Holiday decorations are intended to be used only for a short timeframe,” says Valinotti. “Keeping them up for several months or all year long exceeds safety limits and shortens their life span.”
QBE Regional Insurance specializes in property and casualty insurance through subsidiaries General Casualty, Unigard, Farmers Union Insurance and QBE Agri.
Through these subsidiaries, QBE Regional underwrites insurance for businesses in 40 states and for individuals in 29 of those states.