Mostly a hobby, maybe ten paid days a year, and one venue recently asked me for a liability certificate which is what started this. My home contents policy has a single item limit well below what the longest lens is worth. I would rather not insure everything if the realistic claim scenarios are all excluded anyway.
I claimed once, for a lens destroyed by a wave I misjudged. It paid, but at actual cash value rather than replacement cost, which meant a five year old lens paid out at less than half what an equivalent used copy cost me. The lesson was to read which of those two words is in the schedule, because the difference is much larger than the price difference between policies.
Get three quotes, insist on the full policy wording, and check unattended vehicle, commercial use and replacement basis. If any of the three is wrong for how you actually work, the price is irrelevant. A broker who works with photographers is worth the ten minute call.
The structural thing to know is that you are choosing between a rider on your home policy and a separate scheduled or inland marine policy. The rider is cheaper and usually caps out low, refuses commercial use, and quietly stops applying the moment you take money for a job. The standalone policy costs more, typically quoted as a percentage of the total insured value per year rather than a flat fee, and it is the one that covers you working. Since you do ten paid days a year, the rider probably does not cover the days you most need it.
Different view: I self insure the bodies and insure only liability. Bodies depreciate fast and I buy used, so a total loss of my kit hurts but does not end me, whereas a claim from a venue for someone tripping over a light stand genuinely could. The liability certificate is also the thing venues ask for, not equipment cover. I put the premium difference into a separate account each year and after four years it holds more than my kit is worth.
Self insuring the kit is defensible, but do not let anyone read that as skipping liability. The venue asking for a certificate is asking about the other policy entirely.
@hemline_hank · 4w ago · 3 replies
Read the unattended vehicle wording before you read the price, because that clause is where most camera claims die. Plenty of policies will not pay for theft from a car at all, and the ones that do usually require the gear to be out of sight, the car locked and often the theft to involve forced entry, sometimes with a time of day restriction on top. Given that your bag lives in a boot, that single clause should decide which policy you buy. Everything else, replacement cost versus actual value, worldwide cover, deductible, is secondary to whether your most likely loss is even covered.
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@rawfileruth · 4w ago
I had not considered that the way I store it is the thing most likely to void the cover. That is genuinely useful.
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@clinicfloor_amy · last mo.
Ask the broker to show you the exclusion in the policy wording, not in the brochure. Two of the three quotes I got looked identical until I did that.
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