[hackerspaces] How to acquire insurance for your space

[Gui Cavalcanti]

Paul,

Thanks for the kind words!

For us, liability & property were treated as a single entity - looks 
like it's different across states.

No insurance will cover your business being delinquent (i.e., not 
maintaining the saw), in my experience. If you're going to provide 
access to equipment for money (or in kind work), the onus is on you to 
make sure the equipment's in good repair. What insurance will cover is a 
member cutting off their arm and suing you if they'd gone through your 
testing process and weren't using the tool properly (or were using a 
tool they weren't checked off to use, yet).

You're correct, our insurance doesn't cover theft - it was one of the 
things we had to 'give away' in negotiations when they realized the 
implications of memberships that offered 24 hour access.

-Gui

On 5/23/2013 4:26 PM, Paul Brown wrote:
> This is definitely the best article I've seen written on US 
> hackerspace insurance.
>
> A few additional things I learned from my experience with Dallas 
> Makerspace:
>
>   * Commercial Property and General Liability are treated as two
>     separate types of insurance.
>
>     General Liability
>     "will pay those sums that the insured becomes legally obligated to
>     pay as damages because of bodily injury or property damage" (trip
>     and fall lawsuits)
>
>     Commercial Property
>     "will pay for direct physical loss of or damage to covered
>     property at the premises described" (fire, theft, etc)
>
>   * I'm still confused about this, but I was told neither of the above
>     insurances will cover a hackerspace whose negligence results in a
>     member's arm getting cut off by a poorly maintained table saw
>     (just an example). And they probably won't cover a member stealing
>     things.
>
>   * Some states have broad volunteer immunity laws, and in those
>     states - D&O insurance seems to only be useful for covering bad
>     things which happen outside of the
>     volunteer's responsibilities (like slander, etc).
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 23, 2013 at 2:35 PM, Gui Cavalcanti 
> <gui at artisansasylum.com <mailto:gui at artisansasylum.com>> wrote:
>
>     All,
>
>     I've been working with MAKE on creating a gigantic primer about
>     the nuts and bolts of starting makerspaces, and they just posted
>     the first in the series here:
>     http://blog.makezine.com/2013/05/23/making-makerspaces-acquiring-insurance/
>
>     The primer deals with how to acquire insurance for your
>     makerspace, a subject which I know has been talked about on this
>     list several times. Hopefully, this information helps fledgling
>     groups across the world (though, unfortunately, the information is
>     somewhat tailored to American spaces as I have no experience with
>     international insurance).
>
>     The Making Makerspaces series will continue over the next few
>     weeks, as I work through a ton of raw data generated from our Make
>     a Makerspace conferences on how to effectively plan, build out,
>     and start spaces. Keep an eye on the MAKE blog if you want to
>     learn more, and let me know if you have any special topics you'd
>     like to see addressed.
>
>     Thanks!
>
>     -- 
>     Gui Cavalcanti, President
>     Artisan's Asylum, Inc.
>     http://www.artisansasylum.com
>     Cell: (857) 389-7669 <tel:%28857%29%20389-7669>
>
>     _______________________________________________
>     Discuss mailing list
>     Discuss at lists.hackerspaces.org <mailto:Discuss at lists.hackerspaces.org>
>     http://lists.hackerspaces.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>
>

-- 
Gui Cavalcanti, President
Artisan's Asylum, Inc.
http://www.artisansasylum.com
Cell: (857) 389-7669

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.hackerspaces.org/pipermail/discuss/attachments/20130523/1cb1cd0d/attachment-0001.html>