Affinity Insurance Brokers (AIB) has announced the launch of a new Outdoors Adventure, Leisure, and Tourism Insurance package.
After working on an industry-specific risk product for nearly one year, the Aon-owned business and Beazley Underwriters have signed a binder agreement with a AU$20 million dollar capacity, thanks to the help of outdoor industry bodies including the Outdoor Council of Australia, Outdoors NSW and ACT, and Outdoors Victoria.
“The partnership with Beazley enables us to continue to support our clients and grow this market by providing a tailored, direct, and connected experience backed by Affinity Insurance Broker’s team of experienced outdoor and leisure broking professionals,“ said Aon’s Australia Affinity Business Managing Director Lisa Henderson.
This new liability product will give an occurrence-based language for the tourism, outdoor education, adventure activities, caravan parks, and campsite industries whose activities are covered by the existing accreditation systems or the Australian Adventure Activity Standards (AAAS).
Initially, AIB has been limiting access to the new scheme to renewals for their existing clients.
“Our commitment is to our clients and the long-term future of the outdoor industry, to ensure competitive and sustainable insurance solutions in a traditionally hard to place market,” said AIB Client Director Paul Davenport.
“Our new relationship provides increased underwriting capabilities, improved claims support, and at last some stability for this market segment.”
Affinity is focusing its efforts on a direct-to-client business model to address the most significant operational risks of the outdoor industry and ensure the portfolio’s sustainability. However, they will remain in partnership with third-party brokers to renew existing placements.
The liability insurance solution is built on strong risk management frameworks backed by industry-wide accreditation systems. Additionally, the insurer will be using an educational program that will launch in July 2022. It will focus on the major operational risks that are associated with many activity-based companies, such as:
- Staff Recognised Qualifications/Training/Induction/Supervision
- Maintenance and Inspection
- Operating Procedures
- Incident Management and Emergency Response
- Risk Assessments
- Third-Party Site Inspections
- Activity specific accreditations
The pilot education program, created in collaboration with Outdoors NSW and ACT, will meet the requirements of a wide range of stakeholders such as the landowners, schools, state departments of education, insurers, consumers, and employees.
“It has been increasingly clear that the Outdoor industry needed to lead in benchmarking its processes to give its stakeholders faith and certainty of the risk management and operational processes,” said Lori Modde, chief executive of Outdoors NSW and ACT and a board member of the Outdoors Council of Australia.
“This program is part of a larger strategic process which will result in working with current and new accreditation systems that give the industry long-term assurity of insurance coverage. I am confident we are moving in the right direction for the industry and thank Affinity for supporting this initiative”.
Greg Shallard, specialties client manager at Affinity Insurance Brokers, said they are enthusiastic about the new initiative. Australia has many high-quality operations yet has a long history of various codes of practice without any solid system for stakeholders to compare activities against.
“The key goal with our support for this is to recognize the quality operators in the industry and lift the overall standard to ensure the delivery of a safe and enjoyable experience for participants with the additional outcome of creating a sustainable insurance environment for businesses.”
The new Outdoors Adventure, Leisure, and Tourism Insurance package has been available since May 1.
For more information, call 1300 130 535 or go to www.affinityib.com.au.
This article originally appeared on Australian Leisure Management.