Lloyd’s has a reputation for insuring the “weird and wonderful”, but not everything makes insurance sense.
Insurance Business spoke to Heather Ciavarella, senior business development manager at Lloyd’s Canada, about some of the stranger calls the company has received for insurance placements.
“I did have a call from somebody who wanted to insure his beard, which was very unusual. We get quite a few calls, on a regular basis, of people trying to insure weird and wonderful things,” she said.
“I guess, from our history, we are known to have insured some weird and rather wonderful body parts of celebrities – so I guess that kind of carries over into some folks thinking we insure pretty much anything here.”
Sometimes people are just making a joke, Ciavarella said, but other times you can tell a call is legitimate – like a man who called to insure his camel, which could be heard grunting in the background.
“If it is actually something insurable, I will do a little bit of homework and find out if there are some Lloyd’s coverholders… who might be able to actually help out with these individuals,” she explained.
Ciavarella has fielded calls for multiple-birth insurance, for people who have found out they’re pregnant and want to insure to claim payments it the pregnancy turns out to be twins or triplets; for infection following surgery; unique aircrafts.
“I think it’s the nature of Lloyd’s [that makes us get these requests],” she said. “And what happens as well is insurance companies who can’t help will sometimes refer these folks to Lloyd’s. I think we’re a little more capable to insure some of these more off-the-beaten-path types of insurance.”
Historically, of course, there is precedent in Lloyd’s receiving strange insurance requests – and in placing the policies.
Some of the famous cases have included: Bruce Springsteen insuring his voice for £3.5 million (NZ$6.78 million), Dolly Parton has insured her reputedly 40DD breasts for £3.8 million (NZ$7.36 million); Rolling Stones’ guitarist Keith Richards’ hands are insured for US$1.6 million (NZ$2.33 million); and European winemaker and taster Ilja Gort insured his nose for US$8 million (NZ$11.6 million).
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