Are You Covered?

Are You Covered?

If a parent, or guardian, of a child in your care “thinks” that you, or somebody in your Center (or Family Child Care Home), is at fault for their child’s injury or death, you could be sued. Do you have enough cash reserves to pay $1.5 million dollars to a child’s family because their child choked on a peach and died? In March of 2011, a Madison County Tennessee jury found a local daycare responsible in the death of the child in its care and awarded the child’s family $1.5 million dollars due to the 22 month old dying from choking on a peach while at the daycare center.
No matter how careful you are, accidents do happen, and they truly are accidents, but you could possibly still be found liable if there was something that could have still been done to prevent it. To minimize your financial risk, and provide your childcare business with financial protection, it is a very wise to get Childcare Liability Insurance. Childcare specific Liability policies can give you coverage for: bodily injury, property damage, accidents, medical payments, personal injury, and allegations of abuse or sexual misconduct. Some policies even cover the litigation, and legal expenses, that arise from any allegations or accusations. Even if you win the case, you could accumulate a good deal of legal costs. A well designed Childcare Liability policy can give you peace of mind that your business is financially protected just in case any of those situations do happen.
BE AWARE: If you have a Family Child Care Home, be aware that most home owner’s policies do not cover, and specifically exclude coverage, for a childcare business in your home. Some insurance carriers may not even provide you home owner’s coverage if you have a home daycare business. (You can check your home owner’s policy under the “Exclusions” on your policy documents.) The bigger, constantly advertised, insurance companies that you may have your home owner’s policy with, can be very particular about childcare businesses being run in your home. What does this mean? If you have a claim related to the business at your home, you could be on your own paying for anything related to that claim, and your home owner’s policy could also be canceled. You should get a Childcare specific liability policy that will be in addition to your homeowner’s policy.
The rates on Childcare specific liability policies can vary, but are typically reasonable. It all depends on the amount of coverage that you want, or need, and what you want coverage for.
It is much better to have the proper coverage in place ahead of time, because you have to have coverage in place before any claims will be covered. You can’t go backwards. Ask your agent questions, and let them know what you are looking for in coverage so you can have a policy built specifically to your business needs.

By Dan Gillespie
dgillespiewave@gmail.com