Okay so let’s talk about drone insurance. One of the first insurances that we picked up was hull and general liability insurance. While this is fantastic to have, it’s far from the only type of insurance that you need to carry. Depending on the kind of work that you were doing will also depend on the type of insurance that you need to carry. Now of course what we talk about will depend on the kind of business structure you have and the kind of footage you are shooting. Also, full disclaimer we are not insurance providers, nor should you take what we talk about as the role. You should reach out to your insurance provider and determine what exactly you need and what is the best coverage for your company.
So let’s back up a little bit and talk about what exactly hull and general liability insurance apply to. Hull insurance is insurance that will cover the cost to replace or repair your drone. The insurance coverage will be based on the total cost of what you’ve spent on your drone and any additional equipment that may be flying on
the drone each mission. General liability is coverage that can protect you from a variety of claims including bodily injury, property damage, personal injury and others that can arise from your business operations. At a minimum, these two insurance policies are items that you should invest in immediately upon starting your business.
A third insurance policy that you should look into is professional liability. Professional liability insurance helps protect you against negligent claims even if you have not made a mistake. Examples would be digital volumetrics of aggregates for which your client claims that the amount to quoted to them for that rock pile is inaccurate. This type of liability helps protect you for any types of claims where your client has specified that you did not complete an accurate job for them. Another example would be the loss of digital media on a hard drive that you were to deliver to your client that it did not make it to them before the data was corrupted.
Now depending on the type of business that you run the next two may be a bit confusing, but a necessity. Those two policies are automobile coverage and workers compensation. Most times if you are an owner operated business and do not have additional employees you may not have a need for workers compensation
coverage. Most times when you are first starting out you may be utilizing your own personal vehicle for a business function. Some clients may require that you have some sort of worker’s compensation and automobile coverage to ensure that they do not get penalized by you being on their worksite without worker’s compensation or auto coverage. Most times personal auto coverage will not cover the amounts that your client will need, normally they top out at about $100,000 or $300,000 per incident.
Quickly what you thought may have been a $1500 a year insurance policy will have gained momentum closer to the $4000 a year range. The best business advice that I can pass along is to get with your insurance agent and ensure that you are properly covered as you will not be able to go back and correct the problem at a later point in time. Neglecting to get your proper insurance policies could end up costing you millions in litigation and liability fees.