Helping Event Organizers Insure Against the Unexpected

Concerts. Festivals. Fairs. Sporting events. Live theater. Corporate events. Whether it is indoors or outdoors, we love to be entertained and inspired. We thrive on learning from experts and hearing from speakers we admire. And this is why the events industry is enormous. In the United States, business meetings, conferences, tradeshows and the like provided over 5.9 million jobs.

Event Cancellation Insurance coverage can help to limit the risk for those unforeseeable circumstances like illness or injury to a key person, adverse weather, loss of venue, and other situations that arise. This coverage is purchased in advance of the event to protect the event organizers, sponsors, and other rights-holders. Depending on the event type, policies can be purchased up to three years in advance. It is best to get a policy in place as soon as planning for the event begins.

We discuss options for event cancellation coverage with Scott Lalonde, from Hanleigh Insurance, a CRC Group Company.

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 Featuring:

• Scott Lalonde is the Chief Underwriting Officer of Haleigh a CRC Group Company located in the Windsor, CT office. 

About Hanleigh:
For over 35 years, Hanleigh has designed and underwritten products for high limit disability, personal life & accident, special risk contingency, and other niche insurance needs, including event cancellation. Our clients include some of the most successful professionals, athletes, entertainers, and organizations in the world. Hanleigh utilizes a balanced approach of discipline, creativity, and industry-leading sales support, allowing us to provide insurance solutions quickly, competitively, and accurately. As an organization, we are committed to superior service within all aspects of our business and pride ourselves on experience, market knowledge, and unique, consultative strategies. 

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Transcript

Dan Wentz: [00:00:21] Coronavirus has caused most event organizers to look at canceling or postponing their events and the. Foreseeable future. Now's a great time to learn more about it. about event cancellation insurance and that coverage for your insurance. We're joined by Scott LaLanne, who knows a little something about event coverage.

He's with Hanleigh, a CRC group company that specializes in event coverages as well as some other stuff. Hi, Scott, how are you doing? How are things in Connecticut? You guys had a hurricane blow through this week. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:00:54] We did. We're we're still recovering. There's some towns digging out. 

Dan Wentz: [00:00:59] Yeah, we had this, this, this media cast as I like to call it scheduled and, your power was blinking and I felt, I was like, Oh wow, you've got some things to deal with it 

Scott Lalonde: [00:01:10] that 

Dan Wentz: [00:01:11] we can postpone this and record it at a later date.

Thanks for being here, despite all that, the tough week that you guys are having, let's get into event cancellation coverage. Talk more about that. What type of. Of events. Are we looking at with event cancellation coverage? What are the common types? The not so common types.

Scott Lalonde: [00:01:38] So Dan, we can cover a wide variety of event cancellation. typically most put associated bank cancellation with a concert or something like that. But most often it can also be just a corporate event, whether it be a corporate function or a conference to attend to. we can also cover event cancellation and different instances around that unique situations that also could be covered boxing events where promoters, where an individual can't can't appear.

or if you could have a speaking engagement. Where there's a key keynote speaker who may not be able to attend due to a hurricane or some other events like that, that can get in the way we can cover all kinds of different scenarios around that. 

Dan Wentz: [00:02:25] I would imagine there's not a lot of events happening right now.

I mean, you look around the country and there's a lot of cancellations out there probably 98%. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:02:33] Right. Yeah. There's, you know, certainly with most States having limited numbers of people, a lot of, a lot of conferences, third and fourth per have moved online and we're looking at ways where we can cover those through event cancellation.

Should the knee. Come up, should they need a ride? there's definitely interest being drawn in that. And most folks have really pivoted, right? Because most, most comp most conferences or events were canceled for this year. They're already looking out to next year and looking to make sure they get there by cancellation in place, because it's become so relevant this year with the cancellation of so many different events 

Dan Wentz: [00:03:13] with this new demand, is it getting tougher to place 

Scott Lalonde: [00:03:16] it?

It is there then a little bit of shrunk and capacity in the market. if you can imagine this impacted everything from the Olympics down to small weekend festivals that are, that are pretty much the bread and butter of the industry, where there's a lot of them that you know happen and they're not big payouts, but you think of the Olympics and the, the big pay out that that has that's shrunk.

The overall capacity for event cancellation. And, or it's caused insurers too. I want to put specific exclusions in place. So previously, for example, you could have bought out a pandemic exclusion or a communicable disease exclusion right now, the market just doesn't have an appetite for that. and I think it'll be some time, right?

Until, until things returned to pre pandemic levels of, for a period of time. I think we'll continue to see. The availability of a pandemic, exclusion being bought out or a communicable disease being brought up as being very, very limited. 

Dan Wentz: [00:04:19] Yeah. And I think I may be throwing you a curve ball here, but since we're on the topic of COVID and event cancellation, as it relates to that, so people with existing policies are they, are they covered on this?

is this, you know, obviously COVID was something that no one really thought was going to happen. I mean, maybe we should have planned for it, but I don't think anybody was, was thinking it would, be to this extent that it has a, so people would existing policies. What's, you know what. They have to check their policies or what's the situation with them.

Scott Lalonde: [00:04:51] Yeah. My advice to folks with existing policies would be sure to read through your different policy, which, because it's a great idea to put event cancellation far in advance of the event that you have, whether it be due to. Destruction of a building or not appearance of an individual. It's often a smart and wise decision to put it in place a long time in advance.

So for example, if you were looking to place this coverage in January for an event that happening anytime around now of which we worked on several, you've taught you very well. Could have your community. Well, he's in DEMEC coverage available to you. it's only been more recently. That that's really been excluded, from the coverage.

So, you know, my advice would be, make sure you check your policy thoroughly, talk to your agent to see, did you cover that in the past? Because it very well that you could still be protected. 

Dan Wentz: [00:05:46] Yeah. And if you're, I mean, everybody should be looking at their policy. right now and planning for the future, because I don't think this is a thing that's going to, you know, just go away on us.

It's going to be around for a while. So, definitely a good time to look at it. so when we're talking about events, there is a lot, there's a big variety of events, a lot of different types of events, and there's also 

Scott Lalonde: [00:06:07] different 

Dan Wentz: [00:06:07] structures to how those events happen. I'm talking mainly about like management show managers.

you know, different stakeholders, what types of people inside an event should be approaching their agent about event cancellation coverage. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:06:23] So whether you're the organizer of the event or you're one of the key participants, any of those individuals who would want to talk to their, talk to their broker, their agent about event cancellation, certainly with anybody, with a stake in the game as well.

for example, if you're a charity, who's a beneficiary of a golf tournament, they may want to consider event cancellation that because being the beneficiary of that. Charity tournament. If that doesn't take place, the charity, the charity may be out some significant income, and there's a possibility that they could get that covered.

So they want to take a, take a look at that, and there's a lot of different unique. Possibilities, when underwriting this, you just want to reach out ahead of time and work with your underwriter because we can cover all kinds of different points. So it can include, you know, a set up or a tear down of a conference, which part, the policies at various points.

So there's a lot of different aspects that might take place. Your event may go off, but there may be some. Other reasons why you need to cover the backend. So it's important to reach out ahead of time to kind of share that information. 

Dan Wentz: [00:07:31] Yeah. You make a great point about charities. a lot of people are not really considering them now because there's a lot of, of other things to look at in the world, but charities they've gotta be struggling now too, because I would imagine a, a portion of their income comes directly from events.

and you know, when you cancel those events, it's tough to get people to give money the same way. So. that's really interesting. So they should definitely be looking at it too. what about events that don't generate revenue, corporate meetings? I think you mentioned before, but if there's no revenue attached to it, should they consider the, the coverage as well?

Scott Lalonde: [00:08:06] They can consider the coverage because you can also, you have a number of expenses associated with a comp. Prince right. If you're bringing employees from across the country. And I know that can be limited maybe a little bit, but, but if you're bringing employees from across the three, you're getting hotel rooms, you're setting up staging.

There's a number of expenses that go with that you cannot event cancellation can also cover your expenses or it can cover your revenue. And in some instances it can cover both. so in a non revenue generating type of event, you, you could look to cover your expenses, to make sure if you have to cancel.

That you're protected ahead of time. 

Dan Wentz: [00:08:40] So, how does it work? Right? We should talk about it. So you mentioned expenses and gross revenues. Can you give us kind of an overview of how, how the policies are? 

Scott Lalonde: [00:08:48] Sure. Well, not each policy is the same. so as I mentioned, you know, you can cover revenues, you can cover expenses, you can cover a combination thereof.

There's also a number of additional riders that go on with the coverage, right? So if you think of a typical outdoor event, they're, they're going to be a parallel. adverse weather, right? So the hurricane at the top of this, a hurricane might be an exact that would cancel an event, you know, several days out.

It could be after the hurricane where the building has been damaged and needs to cancel as well. but then there's other pieces, that you need normally wouldn't think of day to day other riders. Yeah, come up. So national day of mourning. Yeah, should we have to have that for president or an important person to Congress, right.

Those are additional pieces that can be added on to the coverage that you may not necessarily think about up front. but certainly could come into play. I mean, we've seen crazier things in 2020, correct? Yeah, 

Dan Wentz: [00:09:47] absolutely. We sure have, eh, you know, Planning for the unexpected. I mean, if someone has thought about it already, like you guys, you know, you have a list of stuff that list of riders that people should be considering adding to their insurance, you should probably definitely take a look at it.

Cause I think this has taught everybody a lesson about being prepared and having the appropriate insurance in place, especially when you think it's not gonna happen. the old Murphy's law, right? You think it's not going to happen? It probably will. so yeah, definitely look at it. so, have we talked about what it covers yet?

What is so, so it's, you know, you're going to get revenues back. You're going to get your expenses back, right. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:10:28] Yeah, you can get revenues or expenses. you may, if you have a keynote speaker here, you could get the cost of covering the keynote speaker. if you're covering something like a boxing event, you could get your marketing costs back.

you could get your costs of rebooking, the venue. There's a lot of different avenues of what you can take. the best route is to really get in touch with your underwriter early. And give them, you know, if it's an event that's happened over multiple years, any loss experience or any change, if you haven't covered it in the past, that's important for the writer to know it's also important to just talk with your on your rider and try and figure out what what's the most important aspect of, what are you trying to cover that way they can tell our policy to fit your specific needs, whether it be for your conference, your concert, or your outdoor event.

Dan Wentz: [00:11:17] And I imagine those because it's a custom type of policy. the, the triggers are negotiable, right? 

Scott Lalonde: [00:11:24] The triggers can be a little bit negotiable. Yes. like we talked about communicable diseases is definitely out, but there can be events. If you were running a golf outing, for example, and adverse weather could be covered and it could be degrees of adverse weather.

Right. So if you had to cancel a portion of it, or if you had to cancel the whole thing, there are different degrees of which, we can cover something also, you know, if you're running a conference, It can start from the beginning of the conference through the end. It can start towards the tear down.

There's a lot of different interplays where we can pick up coverage. 

Dan Wentz: [00:11:59] Okay. So, what do, what does an insured, if they have a loss, what, what, how do they prove they've had a loss? Like what, what types of materials do they need to provide to, you know, start a claim. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:12:11] Typically they want to keep track of what their expenses are.

In, depending on what we're talking about, whether we're covering the expenses or we're covering the revenues, certainly if you have to cancel an event and it's a revenue generating event, you'd want to look at your projected ticket costs. If, you know, if it's a concert or something that would have a prebiotic ticket or pre-purchased ticket, or even not a pre-purchase ticket, but your expected attendance, you want to have some sort of way to document that.

That you can show. We expected 12,000 individuals to show up and due to the poor weather and we had to cancel, we lost out on all the ticket sales. So something like that would be a great example, of what could be covered. 

Dan Wentz: [00:12:55] Do you think is most important to discuss with your underwriter when you're, when you're approaching this type of insurance?

Scott Lalonde: [00:13:03] the key is really to get in, get in touch with them early. No. What, what. What types of perils that you could face, whether it be a weather event, whether it be traveling events, unavailability of a keynote speaker or building, now whether it needs to be postponed, canceled, or relocated, those are all kinds of different.

Parallel. So it could come off and you know, whether or not it's broadcast, is it in the media? Is it not in the media? Those are important things to know as well. If there's an interruption around that, the more you give, the more details you can give the underwriter, the more sophisticated, sophisticated they can become with the right.

and really tailor it to your specific need, and any loss history that, that exists, that if the it's been covered in the past, that's really great information for the underwriter to have. And certainly with so many events canceled this year, anything going forward, if they have coverage before. Or it's great to share that information as well.

Dan Wentz: [00:14:00] Yeah. Yeah. And when it comes to exclusion, are we looking at anything, you know, is, is there anything that's, mentionable there about what would be excluded or what some common exclusions 

Scott Lalonde: [00:14:10] are? So event cancellation coverage is no different from any other insurance policy. They all come with exclusions to some degree, right?

So typical exclusions, depending upon the policy structure, you know, include financial failure. Solvency or default, any withdrawal by a party, on one side or the other, or lack of sales and radioactive communication. our contamination, excuse me. typical, terrorism stuff. Those right now, those are not canceled.

So don't expect there to be coverage. You know, if due to insurance, financial troubles, it has to be canceled. Or if ticket sales are too low, you know, or if a sponsor backs out of an event, those are difficult scenarios for anybody, but that's not what the policy is intended for. 

Dan Wentz: [00:15:00] Great. So, going to places, insurance agents are going to be looking or should be looking for someone who's experienced knows what they're doing, obviously, because there's a lot of different situations.

Events are not a one size fits all type of business. What should people look for and the person or the people or the company they're using to place this type 

Scott Lalonde: [00:15:23] of injury? I'd make sure to reach out early. To your broker to ask questions, bring it to handling. They can reach out to handling directly as well.

and we can ask the types of questions that they may not be thinking of for their event. you know, how are they generating their revenues? have they covered this event in the past? What are some of the different scenarios that they need to cover? What are the scenarios that they're thinking of?

The more information you can get? the better and the earlier we can get it, the, the better the pricing can be on the coverage as well. 

Dan Wentz: [00:15:56] Yeah. So it sounds like you should be looking for someone who is going to ask you a lot of questions you haven't thought about, you know, like you're, you're, you should expect those types of questions to make sure that you're absolutely covered and thinking of every scenario.

Okay. so talk a little bit about handling, how you guys, obviously hear it. The CRC group, you can contact your local CRC group, broker producer. So if you're working with them and you're happy with them, absolutely reach back out to them, find somebody in your area if you want to. But Hanley is a CRC group company as well.

how does Hanley approach event cancellation coverage? And what benefits do you guys have when, when an agent comes to you to, to try and place this type of insurance? 

Scott Lalonde: [00:16:41] So we work with a number of different barriers, to find the best solution that fits for the particular need of that client. one of the things that I think we do well is we will ask a lot of those questions early on and narrow down.

Yes. The also the other thing, Dan is we don't focus on large, super large events. We tend to really understand where our sweet spot is. Golf tournaments to a medium size concerts, small festivals. Those are things where we really have the expertise and we've worked on hundreds of them over the last several years that we know we can hone in and find the best solution for you.

Dan Wentz: [00:17:21] So, contact, handling, contact your CRC group producer, 

Scott Lalonde: [00:17:25] the 

Dan Wentz: [00:17:25] best way to get ahold of you guys. obviously you have a website out there. You can visit the website, the contact information there, Scott, they can reach out to you, right? find you on LinkedIn or wherever you're at. Yeah, go ahead. And 

Scott Lalonde: [00:17:38] you can find me on the Hanley website.

you can also send information to info at Hanley sales and we reach right back out to you typically within 24 hours of your request. 

Dan Wentz: [00:17:48] Yeah. You guys are super responsive. Every time I send a, an email over to that info at Hanley, I get a response pretty quickly. So, I will vouch for that. You guys are super responsive.

Well, Scott, thank you very much for taking the time today to, to be a part of this. I know it's been a challenging week for you guys up there losing power and everything else. but I think this has been a great, a great discussion. We've covered a lot of ground here, so thank you very much, Scott.

reach out to handling if you need some event cancellation coverage, right. 

Scott Lalonde: [00:18:17] Correct. Thanks for your time, Dan. We really appreciate it.