Mike,
Thankyou for the insight, which may very well
be good advice.

However, is there not ALWAYS a conflict of interest
between insurer and insured at claim time ? Having
the SSA as a middleman would not appear to alter that
fact.

The SSA might even be encouraged to become more interested
in overall soaring safety statistics [or at least liability
claim incidents], and develop a more pro-active safety
program. That would hardly be bad for us.

The large pool might well be a captive market for the
duration of any one contract; but at renewal time,
it should also be more attractive to insurers and thus
attract competitive rates.

Am I hopelessly naive ?

Ian



At 04:12 09 June 2004, Mike Borgelt wrote:
On 8 Jun 2004 23:30:15 GMT, Ian Cant
wrote:

David Bingham, writing about Sparrowhawk operations,
mentioned that the USHGA provides liability insurance
coverage for all its members. I checked their website,
and sure enough they have a master policy covering
every member [and every club] up to $1 million, with
a $1000 deductible.

Now, the membership of USHGA is $59 per year, including
a magazine sub.

And while ultralight hang-gliders may have a little
less liability damage potential than a Nimbus, they
are flown by unlicensed pilots under loosely controlled
conditions. It seems that the two risks might be comparable.

Why can the SSA not offer some similar coverage to
all members ? What would it require, and how much
might it cost ? And how many more members might join
SSA just for that ?

Ian






Don't even think about it.
You and the SSA will be in an immediate conflict of
interest in the
event you make a claim. The SSA will want to keep the
premium low by
a low successful claims history, you will want the
insurer to pay out.
The SSA will only annoy you by not paying out, annoy
all the members
if premiums increase- and they will anyway as this
will be a
relatively captive market for the insurer.

Don't believe me? Then find out what happened to the
Brits who got hit
by the parachutist in France and if the BGA insurance
paid out.
The one case I know of in Australia under a similar
scheme had the
insurer knocking back the claim and the GFA (Gliding
Federation of
Australia) deciding not to get involved in backing
the claimant.

The Hang Gliding Federation of Australia has a similar
scheme which
has now caused a huge problem as the insurer has decided
not to cover
the training operations unless the premium goes up
by a factor of 3.

Mike Borgelt