Insurance

[Rumba Rue]

Ok I have recently learned the why's and why not's, so let me explain and I'd like to hear what you all have to say.

Most pirate type groups out there do not have any insurance. They usually have some kind of barrier around their camps to keep the public out.

When you have weapons displayed and personal belongings, you don't want the public to access that. There's lots of stupid people out there.

But with Pirates of Treasure Cove, we have insurance. The reason why is because we have an open camp, no barriers. We invite people to come in. We do have weapons about and we do our darndest to keep people from pulling swords out of the scabbards. Instead, a member will do it and show it to them carefully and explain carefully about it.

I have seen some other groups see what we've been doing and like it and they have decided a no barrier rule either. But their weapons are open many with no scabards and available to the public. As with a group that was next to us at the Escondido event in the spring, they had no barrier, but they had shoved many their sharp pointy objects into a hay bale up front. I saw a number of kids whisking their fingers across the blades. Anyone of them could have been seriously cut.

So who should be at fault? The faire or the group?

Every event makes you sign a waiver that you a participant knows the rules. However, the public doesn't sign waivers when they attend.

I personally like idea of open camps, but I also am quite aware of the dangers present to the public.

In the case of PRP, there is an area outside of the barrier with tables for the public to come sit, chat, or play games.

So I'm curious as to what you all think of this kind of thing.

Lets try and not get into a 'flame-game' here and keep responses resonable.

[Silent]

That's something to think about

[Merrydeath]

I'm not sure how much it was, but I know there is Actors Insurance available for a nominal sum. I think somewhere around $200 for a whole group. Broken down by how many in your crew, would make that amount usable.

[Bloody_Mary_Bonney]

We may not be pirates in my guild but the "rack" were we store any and all sharp pointys is guarded by someone at all times and we never let anyone touch anythin! the things we allow the use of is shinai and thats because we have the padding (masks ect) were a hospitality guild and envite people in for a drink whenever we can but we are know for our guards ( i'm the first sargent and usually the one that has to be in charge.... life sucks) and for the most part we keep it simple and keep it safe...

[Hawkyns]

We will probably go the insurance route this year. I can get it through one of our local umbrella re-enactment groups, so it won't be too bad. We are far more in the living history/weapons demos/live steel combat game so as we do more pirate themed events, rather than museum re-enactments the insurance becomes more of an issue.

It used to be that the sponsor of an event would get a blanket policy to cover all participants, but the cheap bastards are now expecting us to cover our own, rather than bringing us under their site insurance. I have been told, by some people that are in the industy, that the insurance industry is reducing the number of people covered under any one policy, in order to force more people to buy policies. This is to cover some of the huge losses from Katrina.

I don't like doing the insurance game, and I certainly do it under protest. But as long as there are lawsuit happy morons out there, always looking for a way to blame someone else and make a buck off it, I seem to have no choice.

Hawkyns

[Red Dog]

My group has gone so far as to only display the weapons that are being carried. No weapons racks or barrels that require constant attenion. We've not had many problems with children, but with drunken patrons deciding they would show us their expertise. We kinda decided that insurance or not, liability or not, we don't want anyone hurt. We hold impromptu weapons displays and demos when the other toys come out to play then go back in the tent or locker. Kinda a bummer sometimes.