Do I need Wedding Insurance?

Now that it’s finally warm outside, its not just summer, its wedding season! As you prepare to walk down the aisle, you may have been told you need insurance for your wedding. Do you? After all, isn’t a wedding just a private event? What could you need insurance for?

Well, just to start, if you look hard enough there is someone willing to sell you insurance for just about anything. That doesn’t mean you need to buy it. There are three basic categories that come under the heading of “wedding insurance.” They are wedding liability insurance, wedding gift and jewelry coverage, and event cancelation insurance. While these all cover real things, you personally may not need some or all of them.

Two out of the three of these have elements included in your renters or homeowner’s insurance policy. Wedding liability insurance is a personal liability insurance policy that covers bodily injury and property damage including liquor liability, specifically for the event. It usually costs somewhere from $100-$300 depending on the size of the event. Well, all forms of homeowner’s insurance (including renters and condo) covers personal liability. Personal liability covers bodily injury and property damage that you cause while acting as a private citizen. (Of course there are limits to this, but getting married isn’t one of them and neither is liquor.) Personal liability insurance policies, however, generally cannot list other parties (like your venue) as additional insured, while a special event policy can. Your insurance agent can provide proof of coverage to the venue for you.

The most important thing to do is to make sure the parties covered for the homeowner’s policy are the parties getting married. In this case, it’s not a bad idea to add your spouse to your homeowner’s insurance before the actual wedding day. And, if it was the parents that signed the contracts to rent the venue, than it is their homeowner’s insurance covering the event.

At the very least, ask your venue if they will accept your homeowner’s insurance instead of a special policy – it can be a source of significant savings for something that you already have.

Wedding gift and jewelry coverage is strictly personal property insurance with more narrowly defined covered property. Your homeowner’s insurance provides coverage for your property anywhere, not just in your home. The issue here is sub-limits to covered property. When people think of what could happen to wedding gifts, they are mainly concerned with theft, theft of cash and checks. Actual physical gifts are mainly sent ahead of the wedding. Your homeowner’s insurance usually limits theft of cash to about $500. Weddings often involve more, much more. Some wedding gift policies can cover larger amounts of cash, but require that you estimate the amount beforehand, which presents its own challenge. A better solution might be giving all the cards in a lock box to a responsible member of the wedding party to be retrieved the after the event. If you are in a hotel, give the box to the front desk to put into the hotel safe.

Wedding policies also often cover wedding rings and jewelry. This is universally covered (but limited) on homeowners insurance. Since you will have your wedding jewelry forever, short term insurance doesn’t make much sense. Yes, it’s only a few dollars to add to the wedding insurance policy, but if you annualize that amount, it’s not a very good deal for the year. Fine jewelry should be placed on a jewelry floater, or rider on your homeowners insurance that specifically lists the items and values, and is supported by documentation if necessary.

This leaves us with wedding cancelation insurance. There is no equivalent homeowner’s coverage that you may already have. Event cancelation insurance pays you for your out of pocket expenses should your wedding be delayed or canceled due to a specified list of reasons (and yes “change of heart” can be a coverage trigger). It returns deposits lost to the travel, venue, caterer, photographer, band, limo, et cetera. Before purchasing this insurance, compare it to the refund policies of your individual vendors. If your venue will refund your deposit in case of severe weather such as a hurricane (or re-schedule for no additional cost) then why purchase what is basically a refund policy through insurance? This is an especially important consideration for “destination weddings” where severe weather can prevent travel.

The take away message of this is not that wedding insurance is never needed. Each couple should evaluate what they already have on their homeowner’s insurance and what they actually need. Best wishes to all the brides to be!

Don’t fall victim to copper theft!

With copper currently trading at over $4.00/lb and scrap yards paying $3.25/lb or more, copper is becoming an increasingly attractive target for theft. And, to make matters worse, increasingly thieves are “scrapping” actively used copper to sell.

Most of us have heard of thieves breaking into vacant homes buildings to steal the wiring and old plumbing to sell for scrap value, but with higher prices thefts have become increasingly brazen. Currently, there is an uptick in theft of copper condenser coils from building air conditioners. The Des Moines Register reports on a case that a police officer said was his first experience with air conditioner copper theft, but I can personally testify it is common in Chicago.

Air conditioners contain a large copper coil that is used to exchange heat from the building with the outside. While home air conditioner coils typically weigh in the range of twenty pounds, commercial coils can weigh far more. This makes small and midsize commercial buildings attractive targets. Thieves cut the coils from the units at night. To operate these units must be located outside, and are often behind the building or on the roof. They have a flimsy sheet metal cover that is easily cut away even if locked. Coils are rarely removed delicately, often destroying the unit in the process. Building occupants often go unaware of the theft for days or weeks, until the air conditioning is turned on. The cost to replace the unit often runs into the thousands of dollars for what, at most, is a few hundred paid on the scrap value. To make matters worse, replacing the air conditioner on a commercial building can trigger that the system is brought into compliance with current HVAC building codes, costing thousands more.

As an insurance broker, I have personally been a party to three copper thefts from air conditioners this year. The smallest claim was for just under $6,000 and the largest was for over $25,000. No thief made off with over $1,000 of scrap metal. The economic impact of these crimes is large and growing.

So how can we protect ourselves? Most steps to prevent general vandalism and burglary will also discourage copper theft. Good lighting at night is a must. Exterior recorded cameras are better, and roving watchmen are best, but usually impractical. Don’t leave ladders around the exterior of your building, and fire escapes should be secured to prevent access from the street. When able, often building a fence around exterior mechanical units or the entire roof can discourage theft. Thefts are effectively discouraged not when it is impossible to commit, but when it is substantially harder than other similar targets.

Also – scrap yards enable this problem. Without scrap yards, thieves would have nowhere to sell their take. Scrap yards however provide a needed service for the community and should not be overly regulated. Most scrap yards are already required to record identity and take pictures, as well of keep a record of what was purchased. However, a balance should be struck. Clearly, scrap yard staff must be suspicious of condensers removed with bolt cutters still dripping with refrigerant. Law enforcement can partner with scrap yards to discover and prosecute offenders.

Until that happens, we must all remain vigilant and protect our own property from this rising cause of loss.