Liability insurance for riggers

The load is not automatically covered

A transformer, machine or facade element that falls is damage to property you had in your care. Without care, custody and control cover with an adequate limit you pay for it yourself, even where liability is beyond doubt. Set that limit by reference to the heaviest and most expensive load you lift in a year, not to your average job, and check whether the limit applies per event or per year.

Ground conditions and outrigger loads are a shared responsibility

If the crane sinks because the mats were laid on ground with insufficient bearing capacity, an argument follows between the crane hire company, the contractor and the rigger. Record who assessed the ground, what information the client supplied about cables, cellars and drains, and which outrigger load calculation was used. Without those documents, the party with the weakest file carries the loss.

Certification is a condition of cover, not a formality

Virtually every policy requires valid personal certification and inspected lifting equipment. An expired inspection on a sling or an uncertified slinger who stands in once can cost you cover in an incident. Keep a register with inspection dates for each item of lifting gear, take rejected equipment physically out of circulation and keep the certificates of everyone who works on the hook.

What stays outside the policy

Damage to the crane itself belongs with the crane hire company's plant or own-damage cover. Downtime losses and contractual penalties because a production line was down for a day are often limited or excluded. Working outside the stated wind limits or outside the approved lifting plan touches the exclusion for intent and recklessness in Article 7:952 DCC. Your own tools that fall are not a liability loss either.

Care, custody and control is excluded as standard

Damage to property that you have in your care: borrowed, hired, being worked on or held in safekeeping: is not covered by the standard cover. For professions where this is the core of the work, a separate care, custody and control module with its own limit is essential.

Public and employers' liability

The traffic gap

Your AVB excludes damage caused with or by motor vehicles. It is precisely there that the Hoge Raad (the Dutch Supreme Court) recognised a separate liability based on the duty to act as a good employer: an employer must arrange proper insurance for employees who take part in traffic for work. A WEGAS insurance policy fills that gap.

WEGAS insurance