BCA membership caving insurance

[bograt]

[gmod] New thread split out from cottage fee thread[/gmod]

Not a criticism Jenny, just intrigued, why do none-caving associates need BCA insurance?

 

[Jenny P]

BCA Insurance requires that for the Club to be covered all members of the club have to be insured.  So the Associate members pay the BCA Club Non-Caver insurance, which is at a much lower rate than the ?17 Club Caver insurance.

Don't forget the insurance covers member-to-member claims as well so, in the event that a non-caving Associate member does some damage to a member or to anyone else whilst taking part in a Club activity, everyone is still covered by insurance.  Check it out on the BCA website under the Insurance FAQs section.

 

[bograt]

Ok, thanks for explaining    :kiss2:

 

[cap n chris]

IIRC it is important to point out that, due to the imposts of regulation and bureaucracy and hence significantly greater costs and hurdles which result, BCA does NOT sell insurance; instead it is provided as a free benefit of membership (of whichever type selected).

 

[Jenny P]

Understood absolutely - thanks for reminding people.

 

[graham]

IIRC it is important to point out that, due to the imposts of regulation and bureaucracy and hence significantly greater costs and hurdles which result, BCA does NOT sell insurance; instead it is provided as a free benefit of membership (of whichever type selected).

And of course, if a club is a BCA member then of course all club members will be BCA members. Fortunately for those who no longer cave, there is a discount.

 

[Badlad]

Don't forget the insurance covers member-to-member claims as well so, in the event that a non-caving Associate member does some damage to a member or to anyone else whilst taking part in a Club activity, everyone is still covered by insurance.  Check it out on the BCA website under the Insurance FAQs section.

How many member to member claims have there been on BCA insurance? It would be interesting to know just how low we have sunk.

 

[nickwilliams]

None.

 

[Badlad]

That is a mighty relief.  Whilst on the subject, have any claims been made against the BCA public liability scheme at all?  I remember during the insurance upset some years ago it was reported that in the 25 years the original scheme had been running no claims had ever been made on it.  I presume this will have changed?

 

[graham]

I seem to remember a claim where an improperly fenced dig led to loss of farm stock, but then this may have been before the current national scheme was put into place.

 

[nickwilliams]

To date, there has never been a claim.

 

[graham]

Yes, I thought the thing I was thinking of was that long ago.

 

[bograt]

OMG!!, is it 25years??, how about the predecessor, BCRA scheme? claims???

 

[Badlad]

Thank you Nick.  That is quite a startling piece of information.  There has never been a claim on BCA/BCRA public liability insurance, the current scheme and the one that proceeded it?  If that is correct then I guess we should all think about what that means.

 

[NigR]

So precisely what does it mean?

That we have all been conned and ripped off from the very outset, having totally wasted lots of money over the years?

Or that we should be grateful for being able to sleep soundly at night, safe in the knowledge that our backs are covered for that fateful moment when a claim will occur as it surely one day will?

Either way, at this moment in time, it must be patently obvious to everyone that the Insurance Company providing the cover made a brilliant business decision when initially agreeing to do so.

Can anyone tell me what criteria were used when deciding to go with this particular Company and who were the people responsible for making this decision?

 

[nickwilliams]

I'm travelling at present and do not have a great deal of time to spend on this.

I was probably the key person who decided that we should choose this policy, although it's not a market which is over-burdened with choice, and the choice made has always been ratified by the BCA Executive.

From the point of view of an underwriter, it's far too early to tell whether the policy they have offered us has been a 'brilliant business decision'. If you take the view that a claim could run into millions then the current payback period for the insurer is well in excess of 60 years.

Nick.

 

[martinm]

If u r a driver on the roads u r continually 'ripped off' by insurance companies, even if you don't make a claim. It is there in case of accidents, same with the BCA insurance. Get over it!  :spank:

 

[graham]

From the point of view of an underwriter, it's far too early to tell whether the policy they have offered us has been a 'brilliant business decision'. If you take the view that a claim could run into millions then the current payback period for the insurer is well in excess of 60 years.

Nick.

... but the above point does need stressing: our insurers take so far has been nowhere near enough to cover a single serious claim. That won't matter to the libertarians amongst us who are only interested in their own personal bottom line, be it financial or otherwise, but those of us who better understand how the world actually works know different.

 

[caving_fox]

Two clubs RDCC and CCCC.

Both of similar caving options 15ish signed up cavers. ~?30 year subs inc insurance* No huts. Very occasional dig. They do vary in how gear is used on trips.

RDCC has club rope, ladders etc, but no club personal kit. Trips are ?2/person to cover rope replacement.
CCCC has personal kit - lamps harnesses etc at ?4/person for those who haven't yet bought their own. But ropes etc are all personal and lent for each trip. CCCC does far more non-vertical trips.


*CCCC has a climbing section. All of whom as above need to be pay BCA non-caver insurance. This (IIRC ?5) charge nearly led to the club dissolving in recent history when a proportion of the climbers objected.

 

[Rhys]

As this is another an off-topic comment, I hope it will be removed as and when the mods get round to tidying up this discussion.

[gmod]I have split the topic as requested and removed some of the more childish to-ing and fro-ing. Please could I ask that, in the future, if you have these types of concerns about threads drifting way off-topic, you use the "report to moderator" button. The moderators do not have the time to read every post on this forum and may never "get round" to tidying up threads! Thanks [/gmod]