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Insurance For Divers

Hey Guys, wanted to know if anyone out there knew of any insurance companies insured for freelance divers?

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Permalink Reply by Fred C. Johnson on January 22, 2015 at 7:52am

go talk to an insurance broker

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Permalink Reply by Giles on April 16, 2015 at 5:13am

Affordable insurance for the freelance or small dive operation is very expensive. Starting at 1000,000.00 coverage for workmen's comp., General Liability, Water Craft / vessel you may be working from, marina operators coverage etc..

A small operation is nearly unheard of anymore, at least legal operations anyway. OSHA regs. require a minimum of three persons on each dive thus your operation must carry workmen's comp for each of them or they have to carry their own. Can you tell me of a Tender that earns enough to pay the cost of this insurance seeing that rates are based on EXPECTED full time annual income?

Right now to be a legal commercial dive operation - you must go BIG or go home.

If you follow the letter of the law; a person with a metal detector goes to a beech to recover a friends lost watch for a fee is breaking the law. I guess I should add the term "Navigable waterways".

I have been researching insurance to answer the same question. If you are able to find some additional information on this please feel free to post here, I would like more info on this.

At this point this is what I am finding, this does not mean I am a lawyer and grasp complete understanding.

O.P. - Good luck

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Permalink Reply by Fred C. Johnson on April 16, 2015 at 7:40am

Free lance diver does not require workman's comp. your exempt as business owner.

Water craft and vessel will fall under hull insurance if you own a boat. If you charter as for certificate of insurance and ask to be additional insured.

general liability is for what you do not how you do it. (ie underwater).

get a 1,000,000 excess liability rider , cost about $250. yr.

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Permalink Reply by Giles on April 16, 2015 at 8:12am

Fred, If you get the time, shoot me a note. I would like to get a better understanding. Sounds like you have had to deal with this. I keep running into cost prohibitive insurance policies. I have become a new subscriber to this board in effort to get a better handlle on starting my first independent buisness rather than work for someone else.

Cheers...