Risk & Business

When trying to manage their insurance policies, many business owners make the decision not to turn in potential claims and decide to take care of them on their own. By paying for small claims, such as property damage, etc, they strive to keep claim frequency down and in turn keep renewal premiums down. One area of insurance they should not try to manage though is potential liability situations/claims. Most policy conditions require prompt notification of any potential liability claims to the insurance company and if a claim isn't turned in promptly, the policy language does note that the company can deny a claim due to late notification. It's important to do this early on since information/memories are still fresh and it gives the insurance company time to completely investigate the potential claim. The potential for a liability claim is most likely the small business owner's greatest area of risk, whether they operate a restaurant, cleaning service or any other busi

Image via Wikipedia With Hurricane Gustav thankfully having passed through and done it's worst, it's looking like the last few months of the hurricane season are going to be quite active. As of this writing there are 4 more storms forming in the Atlantic, Hanna, Ike, Josephine and Karina. The current estimate of insurable losses from the damage caused by Gustav are currently between $2 and $4.5 billion. I mention the insured loss estimate because currently there is a move afoot by the federal government to expand government control of disaster relief and also increased federal disaster insurance coverage. With more federal involvement and more federal dollars spent for disaster coverage, take a look again at the numbers I previously mentioned regarding estimated insurable losses from Hurricane Gustav, came ashore as a Cat 2 and quickly became a Cat 1, and extrapolate the numbers of a busy hurricane season. The private insurance market has done the job it is supposed to do