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Our venue requires liability insurance from our vendors. Is this standard for most places? Our event coordinator says it is. If anyone has gone through this process I’d really appreciate some suggestions/advice. Do most vendors carry liability insurance?
WP
Our venue requires $1 million in liability insurance. We are taking out a rider on our homeowner’s policy and it’s costing us about $6 for the day.
If you don’t have homeowner’s insurance, you can check with renter’s insurance carriers, some major car insurance companies (like Geico), or investigate a one-day insurance coverage policy.
It is common for venues that have expensive items/collections/antiques to require this kind of coverage.
It’s the VENDORS only that need the insurance or YOU as well?
1) If YOU, I agree w/ farmgal above. If you don’t own a home, ask your family if you can use their homeowners’ insurance policy to get the cheap tack-on rider? I don’t know how to do this efficiently without a base homeowners insurance policy, though.
2) If the VENDORS, that is a contractual arrangement between the venue and the vendors. Ideally, the venue should have some form that the vendors fill out to certify that they have insurance. Be careful that YOU are not the one signing to guarantee that your VENDORS have insurance — how would you know if their premiums are current and what levels of insurance they have? The vendors should have to sign, not you. But if there is no form to make it a direct venue/vendor contract, you can make sure the minimum dollar amount of insurance coverage is written into your agreement with each vendor, and get them to counter-sign besides this add-on, and KEEP AN ORIGINAL OF THEIR SIGNATURES.
all of the venues i have looked at require this for outside vendors (particularly because of the alchohol). any vendor doing weddings should be able to accomodate this very easily.
I know our venue requires proof of insurance as well. We are talking to our agent who handles our home owners insurance. But this is a great questions. If we didn’t just purchase a home I wouldn’t know what to do about it.
if you can’t tack it onto anything else, this place will do it - its a little more expensive than $6 but not too bad.
Our venue requires our vendors to have insurance…all of the vendors I’ve met w/ have insurance..I think it becomes an issue when you use a vendor that works at home (ie- a talented florist that does weddings on the side, a cousin’s friend who does dj-ing for fun, etc) My venue said that all vendors must have an insurance policy OR they would have to sign a liability release - which makes that said vendor responsible for all damages/issues/accidents.
Our venue only required it if we were serving hard liquor. I did watch an episode of I think bridezilla and the bride was almost not allowed to have music at the recption due to not being able to get insurance. Couples should have this on their list of questions they ask when looking at locations.
Yes. Your vendors should have general liability insurance.
The proof of this is available by requesting a certificate of insurance from their insurance carrier.
This should not be difficult for the vendor to produce as it’s something they ought to have on hand or can easily obtain from their insurance broker.
But yes, if they don’t have it - you should ask your venue if they have some sort of waiver for your vendor to sign because I am sure venues run into that issue all the time.
And, your venue ought to have their own insurance as well.
WP, I don’t think you need to be worried. All the vendors I’ve met w/ so far have said that they’re insured. And if not, wedsafe is a good option to look into.
i ran into this problem with my wedding coordinator. it was a big nightmare, but here’s what i discovered. my wedding coordinator (independent 3rd party, not affiliated with the venue) is planning the event, so her company is responsible for having insurance. she has the relationship with the venue and all the vendors. mostly they are vendors that she works with regularly, and she covers them under her company’s insurance policy. but when i chose a photographer that wasn’t one of her recommended guys, she hit me with the insurance issue saying that my photographer would have to provide proof of $1M liability insurance. what?! a photographer doesn’t carry liability insurance! i called my photographer and she said that she’d never heard of such a thing. she’s photographed 100s of weddings and has never been asked to provide proof of insurance of sign a waiver. i called the venue and they denied having such a policy. i felt like it was a scam to force me into using her recommended vendors. i was so upset that i almost fired my wedding coordinator.
Our venue also requires 1 million dollars insurance. The caterer they work with who will be our caterer, said that his company has that insurance and will cover everything. He even volunteered to hang things if we needed it so that if he fell he’d be covered. But I believe that if you have one vendor to cover it it’s ok? I might be wrong… but usually the vendor’s have their own insurance! Good luck!
Our vendor required 2 million if we serve alcohol, but said some bartenders already carry it. We were thinking of serving our own to save money…
wedsafe quoted us $250, but wants it served by a licensed bartender… so I guess we might as well just go ahead and find a bartender from a caterer with liability insurance, but, I’m still planning on doing some hard math to figure out what the better deal is.
Try the Wedding Protector Plan from Travelers. You can secure wedding insurance and liability insurance. It’s priced well and they are a reputable company. http://www.protectmywedding.com
Always refer to your contract. There should be some insurance requirements section if it is required. This website not only has lots of good information for weddings and other events, but it also has an exclusive insurance program that they had build for their visitors.
http://www.TheEventHelper.com
@Brad Duggins: I didn’t know, but our contract required us to carry something called “Host liquor liability” which was actually included for free at http://www.Theeventhelper.com website. This info was very helpful for me. Thanks again weddingbee!
I am a wedding videographer based in Canton Ohio. I have never been asked for liability insurance, but I am covered and well aware of the risks. Just FYI, Liability insurance does not cover property damage. It only covers if a someone gets hurt. so as the venue doesn’t get sued. If there is damage you are responsible. That is why you would get what is called “third party property damage” on top of your liability in case the place burns down, then your covered. In case anyone is curious, I get my insurance from http://www.FilmEmporium.com.
I have been doing all these “Online” Companies for wedding insurance and only 2 of the sites will actually give you a quote without filling out 50 questions, submitting, then get spam emails for the next year. Our wedding is half a day and I am only getting this insurance because the place is making us so i don’t need third party coverage. I just want the cheapest price at the 2 million limit that is required. Of all the sites I found the easiest and the best deal was http://TheEventHelper.com Do the comparison and see for yourself. It feels a little shady, but the payment goes through paypal and I got the insurance cards i needed and emailed them right away.
i look at theeventhelper.com it doesn’t look credible cause there’s no phone number. is it safe to use? what happen if in the event something did happen? i have an event in june that required a general liability insurance? and i just don’t want to pay a fortune for it. please help.
I did buy the insurance at theeventhelper.com and you pay for it at paypal (which means paypal will protect you from ID theft) and then a button to return to the site comes up. This button takes you to a page at theeventhelper where you download your policy & certificate of additionally insured. the first thing i looked for was “how do i submit a claim?” the 3rd or 4th page in is the ins company claims dept contact and how to submit a claim. Thay list their phone number, but you can’t see it till after you pay at paypal. i called and talked to a guy named brett who helped me correct a typo on my certificate of additionally insured.
I am a Wedding Videographer and can tell you I have had insurance but have never been asked for proof. Nor have I been asked to have it for an event. I get mine from http://www.FilmEmporium.com. They cover videogarphers but they also have policies for entire weddings. Might be worth checking out.
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