Insurance needed for transient (temporary) dockage?

[rabbi]

well, of course there is a way to cruise some of the EU waters without insurance. Just don't go into marinas.

YOu can add Germany and Netherlands to the list where insurance is mandatory for entering a marina.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by rxcsailnet

Sailing along the East coast of the US, it seems to be hit or miss. Some ask about insurance, some ask to see the papers, for transient stays. In the NW EU (France, Spain, UK, Ireland, most asked for insurance papers. We were also asked for insurance papers for the Caledonian Canal and the Crinan Canal. We carry liability, but they wanted more coverage than we carry. They thought for a minute then let us go.

I have read recently about fires in boatyards and storage facilities, and it seems like these sorts of events end up with all the boat insurers getting together to settle how things will be paid. I have started to read long-term storage contracts, and they require everyone to have liability insurance, and absolve the facility owners of any liability for events like fires. Crazy, I know. I think the reason to require liability is for events like big fires, where everything gets burned to ashes and no one can figure out where the fire started. So the insurers declare some sort of "general liability" for everyone there, and they all pay the owner of the facility for his losses, and then they pay the boat owners whatever they are contracted for.

It is like the situation on cargo ships where they have to throw some cargo overboard to save the ship, even if it is the ship operator's fault that the ship ran aground or on the rocks, and the insurance companies of everyone who has cargo on board have to pay for the salvage and damages to the ship. If you don't have insurance, I don't know whether they can come after you for this situation. We need someone who knows maritime insurance to find out why this is the case.

if this is the case, it would make a lot more sense for the marina to have mandatory insurance for transients, but to do it like a car rental company.

that way they could serve everyone, make more money, and the place would be covered for any unfortunate event that happens while the transient is staying there.

it might cost a little bit more for the slip, but it would be well worth it because you wouldn’t need to waste money on insurance that you are not interested in buying. You also wouldn’t have to keep changing the named insured over and over as you change marinas.

you could extend the same thing to working marinas and boat yards for haulouts and everything like that.

it would be better because the marina would be very certain of the coverage. And the boat owner would not have to worry about anything. Nobody would have to worry about anything.

[Fore and Aft]

Chotu I am sure some marina's use the insurance thing as a way of excluding the boats they don't want. Marina's providing Insurance would be a nightmare. Who polices the risk factor? I for one would be so pissed if a floating wreck came in our marina sank and polluted everything with their diesel and debris. But hey the marina has it insured so the lazy sob owner is covered. I once helped clean up after a big cyclone and so many people got paid out on boats that should never have been insured. Funny enough after that, business boomed for me as more Insurance companies insisted on a survey before they would insure the clients boat. Another insurance company here in Australia tried the no survey thing and they got milked by all these wrecks making claims. I have personally seen three boats they paid out on before they stopped insuring without a survey.
Insurance is no big deal if your boats well maintained.
Cheers

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Fore and Aft

Chotu I am sure some marina's use the insurance thing as a way of excluding the boats they don't want. Marina's providing Insurance would be a nightmare. Who polices the risk factor? I for one would be so pissed if a floating wreck came in our marina sank and polluted everything with their diesel and debris. But hey the marina has it insured so the lazy sob owner is covered. I once helped clean up after a big cyclone and so many people got paid out on boats that should never have been insured. Funny enough after that, business boomed for me as more Insurance companies insisted on a survey before they would insure the clients boat. Another insurance company here in Australia tried the no survey thing and they got milked by all these wrecks making claims. I have personally seen three boats they paid out on before they stopped insuring without a survey.
Insurance is no big deal if your boats well maintained.
Cheers

maybe it’s different in Australia. Who polices the risk factor? Nobody. It’s like a rental car.

when you rent a car in the states and I think overseas as well if I remember correctly, they ask you if you want the insurance. You pay a pretty high premium for a couple days of insurance.

that would be so much easier than trying to make sure each boat has proper insurance set up by hundreds of different owners and insurers. Because the levels of coverage required change and the loss payee changes marina to marina. And half the time people don’t even check as you can see in this thread.

The best solution is to Just roll it right into the bill. And provide it at the marina. The marina could even make a profit off of that like car rental companies do.

And remember we’re talking about transient insurance. Like a rental car. We’re not talking about insurance for long-term slips.

just make it mandatory at the marina, provided by the marina, and you don’t have to worry anymore. It solves the problem on both sides.

It’s not related to surveys at all. I have full liability insurance. I have no survey. So that doesn’t really follow. We’re just talking about protecting the marina.

[rabbi]

Transient or not doesn't matter. You simply aren't allowed into the marina without insurance. Not for 2 hours and not for a year.

So how much should they charge for a night insurance to be worth the effort? 20 Euro per night?

We pay 125 Euro per year. That is for a sailboat under 100sqm sail area and 15 million worldwide liability.
Includes damage to other people, other boats, the marina, pollution cleanup, wreck disposal, at a marina or at sea, dry dock, ...
Minimum liability insurance is around 80 Euro.

There is no market for daily insurance covers. At least not in Europe.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by rabbi

Transient or not doesn't matter. You simply aren't allowed into the marina without insurance. Not for 2 hours and not for a year.

So how much should they charge for a night insurance to be worth the effort? 20 Euro per night?

We pay 125 Euro per year. That is for a sailboat under 100sqm sail area and 15 million worldwide liability.
Includes damage to other people, other boats, the marina, pollution cleanup, wreck disposal, at a marina or at sea, dry dock, ...
Minimum liability insurance is around 80 Euro.

There is no market for daily insurance covers. At least not in Europe.

OK, clearly you didn’t read this thread. This is only true where you are. It’s not true globally at all.

and yes. They should charge €20. If someone doesn’t have insurance already. And they can roll it right into the bill just like a rental car.

If you are getting your boat hauled out for bottom paint, if you are staying for a few days or a week at a slip, what is €20?

some people (like you and I) have insurance already. We can show proof of that insurance and not get the "rental car" insurance. If someone does not already have insurance coverage, it can be mandatory that they get the rental car (marina) insurance. The same thing would work very well for transient boaters throughout most of the world.

I’m not sure if it works like this in Europe or not, but here in the states, we have to change our insurance policy when we go to a marina longer term. That marina has to be put onto the policy as "additional insured", giving them road rights to make claims using your insurance policy that you pay the premiums for that will increase when they make a claim.

There would be a very large market in North America for this. Although, nothing in the boating world is actually a very large market.

Most importantly, it completely solves all of the problems we are talking about in this thread. It would make things uniform. Marinas would make more money. Boaters wouldn’t have to pay as much if they didn't want to.

[rabbi]

Let me re-phrase:
"Transient or not doesn't matter. If the marina required liability insurance you simply aren't allowed into the marina without insurance. Not for 2 hours and not for a year."

Which includes basically all of Europe and an increasing number of marinas in all other regions.

[smj]

Originally Posted by Chotu

OK, clearly you didn’t read this thread. This is only true where you are. It’s not true globally at all.

and yes. They should charge €20. If someone doesn’t have insurance already. And they can roll it right into the bill just like a rental car.

If you are getting your boat hauled out for bottom paint, if you are staying for a few days or a week at a slip, what is €20?

some people (like you and I) have insurance already. We can show proof of that insurance and not get the "rental car" insurance. If someone does not already have insurance coverage, it can be mandatory that they get the rental car (marina) insurance. The same thing would work very well for transient boaters throughout most of the world.

I’m not sure if it works like this in Europe or not, but here in the states, we have to change our insurance policy when we go to a marina longer term. That marina has to be put onto the policy as "additional insured", giving them road rights to make claims using your insurance policy that you pay the premiums for that will increase when they make a claim.

There would be a very large market in North America for this. Although, nothing in the boating world is actually a very large market.

Most importantly, it completely solves all of the problems we are talking about in this thread. It would make things uniform. Marinas would make more money. Boaters wouldn’t have to pay as much if they didn't want to.

Most insurance companies insist on an out of the water survey before issuing insurance, but most haul out yards insist on proof of insurance before hauling you out. So if you don’t have insurance then you can’t haul out to get the necessary survey to get insurance.......me thinks your idea could solve this problem!

[Fore and Aft]

Chotu your hire car analogy is terrible. Most hire cars aren't going to end up having huge recovery costs or big environmental impact if damaged. To me it sounds like you want to have your cake and eat it as well. Insurance is no big deal it just costs money and is all part of boat ownership for us. Same as owning a car, I don't just insure it for the days I drive.
Cheers

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Fore and Aft

Chotu your hire car analogy is terrible. Most hire cars aren't going to end up having huge recovery costs or big environmental impact if damaged. To me it sounds like you want to have your cake and eat it as well. Insurance is no big deal it just costs money and is all part of boat ownership for us. Same as owning a car, I don't just insure it for the days I drive.
Cheers

what does the cost of the claim have to do with the mechanics of the insurance? Absolutely nothing.

if you had pilots renting out planes that cost millions of dollars and capable of killing hundreds of people on the ground, you could still have the same rental car insurance type of system. Recovery costs are irrelevant. That’s just baked into the price of the insurance premium.

you can insure anything.

And I think you just made my point for me. You are silly to insure your car for days that you are not driving. I mean sure it doesn’t work on the car, but it might on a plane. And it does on a rental car. And it does for a boat. How many times a year do you actually go into a marina on a transient basis or for a haul out?

Yet you are paying insurance for all of those days when you are not hauling out at a marina or at a transient dock? That’s just stupid. You're getting robbed.

additionally, having insurance available at the marina ensures complete compliance. otherwise, some people will probably get through that didn’t have insurance. as is the case that we see in this thread. It’s completely variable. Even places that requires insurance may have you sign an agreement saying that you have it. But they won’t ask for proof. Also the employee might forget to ask for proof.

having mandatory car rental type insurance for haul outs and short term slips just plain works. Why are people fighting this idea so passionately?

what a silly hill to die on.

Are you just mad because you are paying insurance right now that you don’t need?

Or are you just super angry at anyone who doesn’t have insurance? I know a lot of people are crazy like that.

For the record I have insurance. I have already said that earlier in the thread. it didn’t require me to have a hall out or a survey.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Chotu

And I think you just made my point for me. You are silly to insure your car for days that you are not driving. I mean sure it doesn’t work on the car, but it might on a plane. And it does on a rental car. And it does for a boat. How many times a year do you actually go into a marina on a transient basis or for a haul out?

Yet you are paying insurance for all of those days when you are not hauling out at a marina or at a transient dock? That’s just stupid. You're getting robbed.

Liability coverage isn't necessarily a waste, mostly because of the environmental component. If something happens while you're somewhere not in a marina and it leads to your boat shedding some floating debris and a bunch of fuel, you can still end up responsible for a rather large cleanup cost. Liability insurance will cover this.

Of course, the risk of an event like that is low, which is why in most cases, liability only coverage is fairly cheap. The potential payout is large, but the frequency of having to pay is low.

Hull coverage is a different animal, and whether or you not you need it requires some personal math. If you can afford to lose the boat and be fine in life, you don't need it. If you'd be homeless and broke if you lost the boat, but can afford the insurance, you should probably have it insured. Very few marinas care about hull coverage, so marinas don't really play into this part of the math.

[rabbi]

There simply is _no_ market for a per-day insurance in the EU. Yearly insurance costs next to nothing and is readily available.

I just googled for 1 minute: The cheapest liability insurance (3 million € per incident) I found starts at 30€ per year for small boats and rises to 80€ for big boats (150sqm sail area).
My own insurance costs 125€ but that is more the luxury variant with much higher coverage and all kinds of gimicks. For example it also covers my own damage in case i get hit by some uninsured US folks slipping anchor.


I use my insurance every minute. Right now in the boatyard for winter storage. If it burns down they will pay the damage caused by me. In the marina whenever the boat is parked. It covers me financially in case I cause damage to another boater in an anchorage or underway. Insurance will pay for wreck recovery and disposal should I sink my boat. It will pay for the cleanup and restoration of environmental damage.

To me anyone has to be financially prepared to make good any damage that they may possibly cause. Using a bike, car, boat, a paperplane taking the kids eye, or some heating oil tanks spillage.

So it's either a few million cash or adequate insurance. Anyone who has neither is acting irresponsible because they rely on other people to pay for them.
In EU such folks are essentially banned from using any sort of vehicle, land, sea, air.

[rabbi]

Originally Posted by Chotu

Or are you just super angry at anyone who doesn’t have insurance? I know a lot of people are crazy like that.

Not being able to make good any possible damage cause by my own actions is what I consider being irresponsible.

Many countries have decided that such idividuals should not be allowed to fly a plane or drive a car. In the EU such individuals may also not enter certain countries by boat, and basically all marinas decided they don't want to accomodate them.


Angry at someone without insurance? Depends!
If they sneak in the EU not playing by the rules they put everyone else at risk. So yes I am angry.

The US is a different region with different approach. There I make sure I am "insured against uninsured". And keep my liability insurance as well .

[Mike OReilly]

As has become clear, mandatory liability insurance for transient (short) stays IS a thing in some areas of the world, but not in others. As to the morality or righteousness of carrying insurance, or not ... let's avoid that kind of chatter. It always drags a thread down hill.

I do think Chotu's idea has some merit. But here's a better idea (says I ). Why not have the marina liability insurance cover all incidents. The cost would be passed along to all customers, but should be minimal, and even cheaper due to far less bureaucracy and administrative costs vs having each individual boater getting the same coverage.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

As has become clear, mandatory liability insurance for transient (short) stays IS a thing in some areas of the world, but not in others. As to the morality or righteousness of carrying insurance, or not ... let's avoid that kind of chatter. It always drags a thread down hill.

I do think Chotu's idea has some merit. But here's a better idea (says I ). Why not have the marina liability insurance cover all incidents. The cost would be passed along to all customers, but should be minimal, and even cheaper due to far less bureaucracy and administrative costs vs having each individual boater getting the same coverage.

Best solution of all!

I bow out. Ha ha