<< Return to AdventureTravelNews - July, 2005
Canadian Tourism Association Takes Bite Out of Insurance Costs
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of short AdventureTravelNews™ articles calling attention to insurance issues and solutions facing the adventure travel industry and will include perspectives from tour operators, trade associations, insurance companies, legal experts and others. Please direct any comments and story ideas to .
Outdoor adventure operators may be interested to learn how the
British Columbia-based Council of Tourism Association’s (COTA) Insurance
and Risk Management program is helping Canadian outdoor adventure
operators save up to 25 per cent on their insurance.
And, those who attend the October 16-18, 2005, Adventure Travel World Summit (www.adventuretravelworldsummit.com), will get the opportunity to hear how the BC tourism industry is tackling the insurance crisis, as well as how better risk management can make an outdoor adventure tourism operators business more attractive to insure.
COTA (www.cotabc.com) represents the 18,000 tourism businesses in the province of British Columbia (BC). It is COTA’s responsibility to ensure that BC’s $9.5 billion (Canadian) tourism industry has the programs, policies, regulations and support needed to thrive.
Since September 2001, outdoor adventure operators in BC (called “nature-based tourism operators” in Canada) have been caught up in a very hard insurance market not unlike the especially litigious United States. Those lucky enough in Canada to be able to purchase liability insurance were forced to pay double, triple, and even quadruple for thinner policies. Rumors spoke of some operators even choosing to go bare and to rely instead on waivers, something that the ATTA also has heard among operators in the U.S. COTA surveyed 450 tourism operators in BC and found that insurance cost and availability were hurting tourism businesses more than the scare of SARS, global instability and the wild fires that swept thru southern BC in 2003. Something had to be done.
On March 15, 2005, COTA, in partnership with Adventure Insurance Agency, launched www.adventureinsurance.ca. The site administers the COTA Insurance and Risk Management program that’s revolutionizing the way tourism operators are insured. For the first-time anywhere, because of the new COTA program, outdoor adventure operators are seeing premiums that truly reflect their risk and not just their revenue and volume. The organization’s unique process, delivered completely online, couples the most up-to-date risk management information, leading tourism and risk management expertise, and cutting-edge technology with a dedicated broker and underwriters. The results are impressive.
“We are very pleased with the results,” said Michael Campbell, President of COTA. “The premium savings and the availability of insurance are proof that the program is working like we intended it to.”
Campbell reminded Canadian tourism businesses who just purchased insurance that it may not be too late to make a switch to the COTA program and save. The program should more than offset any short-rate cancellation penalties.
“Forcing operators to be more diligent with their risk management planning is a big part of why I like the COTA program,” said Steve Noakes, President of GeoQuest Excursions Ltd, an eco-tourism business based in Kelowna. “There was real value in subscribing to the program. I saved 25 per cent on my liability insurance and deepened my current risk management plan by twenty pages.”
Subscribers to the COTA program pay an annual $200 subscriber fee. In return, they get online access to the COTA Insurance and Risk Management Handbook©, tailor-made applications, and an expert review of their application by Pinnacle Risk and Insurance Consultants. Upon purchase of the policy, subscribers get a tailor-made waiver designed by a renowned adventure tourism lawyer.
With the COTA model in place and working, Will Harding, the COTA Policy & Planning Officer who’s overseeing the COTA program, is currently examining how the program might be extended to tourism businesses in the U.S.He suggests there could be positive results for U.S. based adventure tour operators, but is not yet ready to say what level of discounts may be possible. Stay tuned…