Jason,

Some quick advice:

- Make sure you get a commercial-type of insurance policy. Homeowners or renters insurance is very limited in it's scope of coverages especially when it comes to liability and loss outside of your residence or personal vehicle.

- Zurich is a company that I've been dealing with for years. My policy has a 5 million liability rider and about $120,000 worth of umbrella coverage. The cost is about $1500 a year. This is an average. Hartford is another great company with stellar ratings but the same coverage with them will set you back about $3000 a year.

- If you plan on making a business out of your video work then you should get a corporation setup of some sort, either LLC, S, or C. Ask your CPA or family attorney which is best suited to your needs. The main reason for doing this, is in the event somebody sues you - over anything - that you have a separation of assets. This would prevent losing your home and car in event of a lawsuit, otherwise everything you own would be fair game in a judgement against you.

So really, you need two kinds of insurance: Protection for your professional equipment against loss, damage or theft and lawsuit protection.

Zurich
 

Robert, what type of insurance do you have with Zurich? is it a small business policy? i need to get insurance for a shoot and it seems that getting a yearly policy is better. thanks for the advice.

Another insurance question - but this time in UK
 

Hi all,

I am looking to get insurance for a single Canon XL2, used in commercial video production and not rented out or loaned to others. Anyone from the UK got any recommendations for a decent company that might offer this kind of cover?

Cheers.

Ian . . .

Sorry this isn't a recommendation, rather a warning that if you want cover on just one item the insurers will probably have a minimum premium which will make it relatively expensive.

Do you have any other business insurance policies which you can add it on to?

Good point. My other insurance policies are for liability not kit. This is actually the first time I have owned the camera myself - previously I've used a camera that was owned by a regular client (and a generous one at that!) and that was covered under their policy.

Foolish and reckless as I am, I never bothered to insure lighting, grip, audio etc. Individually, the items are relatively inexpensive and are covered (with a wee element of white lying) on my home contents insurance. The camera, though, at nearly three grand . . .

Funny how spending your own money on something sharpens the sense of caution!

Ian, you'll probably find the cheapest way is to add the camera as a named item on your household contents insurance.

Insurance for Equipment
 

Okay - I have all of my equipment including cameras, cranes, dollies, computers, etc...I also rent a house and it is all stored here. Where should i go for insurance for all of this stuff. What do you guys do? It is making me nervous traveling around to shoots and not having any insurance yet.

I have very good luck with RVNuccio.com. It's all on line and they place policies thru Firemans Fund which is a very large insurance group. you can also get liability thru them. They're pretty reasonable.

Don B.

State farm also does this, surprisingly. I had a policy with them a while ago, and then let it lapse 'cause I found out that they apparently didn't support using gear for business purposes, (even though they'd said they did when I explicitly asked them).


So I just got renters insurance, and got a new personal articles policy (this is what covers your gear), and for some reason, now it's okay that I use the gear for business. Around $15K of stuff insured for about $200 a year.

Ok, scratch that. I got a call from them yesterday saying the underwriters didn't wanna do it. . .thought it was too risky, and I got a quote for $330 a year for $12K of gear under their commercial policy. I dunno if I'll go for it.

For about the same money you can get your gear covered AND get $1mm in liability thru Nuccio. I don't work for them but I do "shill" for them as they have been the fairest price wise I've seen in a long time. Do I know how good they are in a claim? No because I haven't had to file a claim EVER with any insurance company in over 20 years. Just luck I guess but if you use common sense and are just a bit vigilant there is a better than even chance you will never have to file a claim either BUT...I digress;-)

RVNuccio seems to me at this time to have the best thing going maybe I'm wrong.

Don

Yeah, I saw that. . .

Looks like I could get all my gear covered for around $250? Crazy!


The thought of itemizing everything again makes me groan, however. Do they really need dates purchased and all that? I was kinda younger and dumber in those days, and didn't save most receipts.

Get the month and year as close as possible and you should be OK. Itemizing is a pain but it's the only way to be accurate. What I had done was to go thru all my stuff, write down what it is, the serial number and then the month and year purchased on a legal pad so when I was typing the form(s) it went pretty quick.

Good Luck,

Don

Luckily, when I didn't know state farm was gonna shaft me, I went through all my gear and wrote down serial numbers and whatnot. So I have most of the info, just not dates purchased. I could maybe give year. . .no idea what month most of of this stuff was.

insurance?
 

i've invested in a mac book pro, hvx200, and a still camera this past year. i'm looking into renting out the hvx, and i know i'll be using my laptop as a field monitor-leaving it open to damage.

my question is how have you guys gotten your equipment insured? do you rent out your equipment? i have about $12000 worth of equiptment i'd like to get insured, is that enough?

thanks for your help.

joe.

Welcome to DVinfo Joseph. I've moved this thread to our business forum. The insurance question has been discussed pretty thoroughly in the past, see the following threads:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=60744
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=59436
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=53920
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=10475

Since you plan to rent out your camera you are definitely operating a business. Be sure to tell this to your agent since it will have an effect on the type of coverage required. Probably also a good idea to discuss with your tax accountant.

Insurance for Canadian Equipment???
 

I've been trying to find reasonably priced insurance (equipment and liability) for a reasonable price in Canada.

The best I can get is $1295.00 a year. That covers $13k wort of equipment and $500k worth of liability. With a $1k deductible. Pretty basic coverage for that price.

I've called WEVA, as they have group insurance rates, and they don't offer insurance to Canadians yet.

Anybody know of any specialty insurers that would offer coverage?

Thanks.

Best option is to get a rider policy on your home insurence, I got something on mine with state farm and only pay $300 or so. You pay double for business. This covers anything from droping it in a river to theft.

hope this helps

Michael

Michael,

I've had brokers looking all over for me, they tell me if I was doing it for a hobby it's OK, but pro... Also, I've got the H1, which is about 12k CDN to replace. My homeowners policy would only cover me for up to 5k worth of camera gear.

I'll try State Farm though.

Thanks,

Ken.

TD/Canada Trust, VanCity, to name a couple. As mentioned, you get a rider on your home/apt insurance. Vancity are brokers, so they'll find the cheapest rate. That would probably be ING Direct as the insurer. TD would be just slightly more. Also check out PC Financial (SuperStore).

Isn't there are problem with the rider on the home-owner's policy option in that if the insurer discovers you've been using the equipment for professional or job-related work they can refuse to pay any claims? When I was looking into it I was told that the homeowner's policy would cover, for example, loss of a computer that you bought for personal use but would not cover the same computer if it was used in a home office by somone who was self-employed or a laptop that you took to work with you. You can get away with saying a $1k camcorder is for hobby use but it's a lot harder to claim a $10k Canon H1 and another $10k of sound gear as a "hobby" expense.

I wasn't told that with an ING Direct quote, but I didn't read the fine print. I can't see what the problem is with getting insurance. A number of my friends have insurance on gear and they use the gear for work. One guy I know got his cam replaced twice. He dropped it in the water once and another time it got stolen out of his car.

I finally found a company that offers a home based pro rider. It's $250 extra for up to 10k CDN coverage. I can top it up to cover the replacement cost for the H1 ($15.00 per $1000.00 for extra coverage). They do have some conditions. One being that they won't cover you if you do biz in the US. I'm assuming it's because of the litigious nature of our southern neighbors. Also you have an income cap of 100k per year in revenues (no danger of that quite yet).

The original stand alone package for $1295 gave me worldwide coverage, where as with this rider I have to drop an extra $390.00 to cover me worldwide. I'm taking the camera out of the country for a month, so I will need the coverage. So the $250 plus the $390 = $640 for a year of pro, global coverage. Of course I could be caught in a technicality if sell a DVD to an American.


I'm told ING does not cover pro video. If you want to call it a hobby, they will cover you.

I have a quick question for policy holders of RVNuccio insurance. I recently contacted them about insuring my gear for a few commercials and music videos, etc. for the upcoming year and was informed by a sales rep that they DO NOT cover these activities. They ONLY cover weddings, bat and bar mitzvah, and events. My business card contained items including short films and docos, and they were quick to tell me I would not be covered.

Are you guys that have insurance through RVNuccio covered under any other policy?

Hey Tim,

I just went through this crap in Canada, and one thing I found was that WEVA has a group policy available for members. I called the underwriter directly to find out if they covered Canadian companies (they don't, yet), he said in most states it's $500.00 a year (NY and Cal are $750.00) which gives you both liability coverage and equipment coverage. I'll see if I can find a link to them.

Hmmmm, I know they (Nuccio) will insure weddings and mitzvahs in case something happens but thats a whole different deal. You might want to call them again and talk to someone else only because you are looking to cover the gear and not the event and who ever (whomever?) you talked to might have misunderstood you.

Don

Need Insurance Advice
 

A friend of mine is starting a Grip Truck business. This involves rental of grip and lighting gear, as well as him being hired as a grip or grip/electric along with the equipment.

We are trying to sort out insurance issues.

Does the renter normally provide a certificate of insurance to the company renting the gear?

Does the rental company need insurance to protect his interests (liability and/or equipment damage or loss)?

Does my friend need liability insurance in case he makes a mistake or some accident happens? What type of insurance should he have?

The insurance agent for his other business is having trouble finding insurance that fits his new Grip Truck business.

Where can you get these types of insurance and what are they called?

What companies provide these types of insurance?

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Production insurance provider?
 

Hi everyone,

We're looking for a company that provides insurance for video production works in South California. Please give us some pointers!


Thank you!

Thanks, Don! Do you have any experience with them?

Equipment Insurance
 

Greetings fellow videographers!

As wedding videos slowly start to become an ever greater income for me, and as I grow my equipment list with the latest and greatest gear I can afford- I have become increasingly terrified that something is going to happen to my gear. It could be stolen, a child could knock the tripod over, the church could burn down with my gear trapped inside, a drunk guest could puke into my camera bag... or other things too horrific to imagine.

I have decided that getting insurance to cover my equipment would be a good idea. I'm assuming that others here have some sort of insurance to cover their gear- what do you guys reccomend for equipment coverage and why?

Hi Adam. This has been discussed pretty extensively in our Business forum. Please see the following threads:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=60744
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=59436
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=53920
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=10475

I'm starting to look for insurance too. Can any of the uk residents give any good brokers over here.

Robert,
Im in the UK and have just got insurance from www.aaduki.com they specifically deal in multimedia insurance, photography ,videography etc so they understand the in's & out's I gave them a ring and they were really helpful and professional and the price seemed good for the cover I was getting

cheers Russ

i found AXA to be suprisingly knowledgable for video production industry...

they do entire business insurance if that's what you're after. which includes...

Contents (Shooting kit, edit suite, any tape stock...with individual cover on more valuable items like your camera or lens)

Public Liability (Yeah, somebody could spew in your bag, but what if you spew in theirs?!)

and also employers liability....and a lot of other ins and out that i forget right now!

I'm know expert, and the industry specific insurers do a good job, but AXA seemed to know a lot more about video industry than i thought.

Just thought that might help anyway!

Travel Insurance for Gear
 

I've looked on the site, looked on other sites...I just can't find any company that offers traveler's insurance for camera gear in the US (found several in the UK)...theres easily 40 different sites saying "GET INSURANCE!" but they don't reccommend any companies. The only places I found would only cover up to $250 per item up to $500 total.

Basically I'm going on a trip (personal, not business) out of the country begining of March, and I want to cover my photography gear (not interested in hauling my FX1 around) against theft. I'm only going to be gone for 10 days, but I have like $4000 worth of gear that I'll be carrying around (afterall, I bought the stuff to get good pictures, why would I take a $250 point and shoot on vacation with me? right?)

Has anyone taken their stuff on vacation with them and purchased insurance for their trip?

A huge plus would be a company that I could purchase business insurance for that would also cover me out of the country even when I'm not using the equipment for business, but thats REALLY hoping for a lot.

I'd welcome any ideas. Thanks!

Look a little closer :-) There's been plenty of insurance discussion here:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=60744
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=59436
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=53920
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=10475

I have State Farm for my home and car, and my agent was able to get reasonably priced coverage for a trip to South America without a problem. Just explain exactly what you're trying to accomplish to your agent. Personally I think it makes sense to use the same company you already have for your other policies. FWIW, after doing some research the kind of coverage my agent chose was called an "Inland Marine Policy."

Uhmm, still looking for a solution. Don't have the option of doing the homeowners insurance add-on , RVNuccio don't cover anything outside of the US...thats pretty much all that was discussed on the links you gave Boyd. Any other ideas from anyone out there? I found a seemingly great company called E&L which covers EXACTLY what I want, but they only cover UK citizens.

Talk to a State Farm agent. Mine was able to find coverage after doing a little research. As I said, they sold me an "Inland Marine" policy.

Gear insurance in Europe
 

Hi:

I know this question has come up a few times, I have read the threads, but I haven't found any links to companies that will do business in my country. I had a gear insurance in Denmark with www.europaeiske.dk - covered worldwide, the whole year for about 7% of the value of the equipment.

But, now I live in Spain and the Spanish sister company offers no such insurance.

Any suggestions on companies that operate in Spain or will sign EU/world wide?

Thanks, Erik