Ever read an insurance policy, boring so most don’t, if you do it’s always a good idea to read the fine print, specifically the exclusions. There are the standard exclusions like nuclear, war, asbestos, pollution, employers liability etc…… but Iam talking about exclusions pertaining to equine activity.

You may be seriously misled or assumed you had certain coverages but the real irony is you could be riding bare back and have no coverage at all.

If your doing things that are not spelled out in your policy there is a strong chance you may not have coverage and the carrier may deny a claim even after paying them thousands of dollars in premium.

Most commercial equine policies are comprehensive general policies, which are supposed to cover all known and unknown exposures. You still may have coverages that are not insured and not even know it.

Let’s take pony rides for instance. Pony rides, as safe as they may be, are a big “ No coverage “ in many equine policies. Doesn’t make sense, it’s kinda like giving a beginner a riding lesson for the very first time.

If you have riding instruction coverage in your policy you would think it was covered. Well it’s not. In fact many carriers won’t even cover the exposure. We had a client who lent his pony to a relative to take to a company picnic to give the employees children something to do. Someone got hurt and the carrier did not want to pay because pony rides were not a covered exposure. Even though in this instance there was no fee charged for the rides. We convinced the carrier they were wrong and got them to reverse their decision and honor the claim because of the type of occurrence. There was no fee involved but it was a real nightmare in the interim. Trail rides is another hidden exclusion which many of us do on occasion. If you strictly give trail rides, for a fee, again you may have difficulty getting the coverage; you may not be covered. However, if the trail rides are connected to a lesson program or summer camp, you may get the carrier to give you the coverage back.

Participant liability exclusion is another hidden exposure the carriers like to sneak in. That means if someone is participating in an activity on or off your property in which you are responsible you have no coverage for that person if they are injured riding a horse. You may be asking yourself by now “What am I paying for then? Good question! Some carriers exclude things like rodeos, polo matches, fox hunting which may not be a concern if your not doing any of those things. But what about exhibitions, or preparing for a show? Riding instruction participant’s exclusions are some very common exclusion I see on policies. How about an exclusion for anyone riding a horse on your policy? One carrier out there I know of still sells an equine policy with this exclusion. Or how about a homeowner’s policy not covering your personal horse liability under the personal liability section? Most homeowners do not cover this at all.

Some carriers are even starting to exclude medical coverages and just give you liability in states that now have an equine law.

Don’t fret now there are solutions to many of these areas. You can try to get the carrier to give them back to you, sometimes for nothing but quite often there is an additional fee – this is called a buy back. You may have to find another carrier that will give them to you. This could be costly or it may be very affordable depending on the carrier your agent uses. You may even have to buy a separate policy.

But you need to explore your options and try to the best of your ability to get the right coverage and price to cover your exposures, only you can determine that. It may, however, come down to the fact you have to drop that part of your business because of the economics. You might even decide to take a chance and not carry the coverage at all depending on how risky you think the exposure is.

Whatever the case may be try to understand what you are getting for your dollar. If you don’t understand what the policy is saying ask your agent or better yet get an interpretation in writing from the carrier directly.  

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