On Wednesday, April 9, 2014 10:21:29 AM UTC-4, wrote:
Is the "no touching of controls" when it comes to insurance common in the power community? If that was part of the policy in my previous glider club, I didn't know it. It certainly wasn't in the club rules. I routinely let passengers try a couple of turns at altitude if they wanted to. Usually, they didn't but sometimes (especially young teens) wanted to give it a try. As far as I can tell, this is not prohibited by by regulations. Am I missing something here or is this just the insurance people being overly cautious? It seems a bit ridiculous.

If you have Costello Insurance, they will tell you that passengers do not touch the controls. Any accident with a passenger that touched the controls may void your insurance whether or not it was caused by the passenger. Beware!