Protecting vessels in high-risk waters
New piracy protection product
A new product to provide cover for vessels entering a War & Piracy ‘breach’ area, such as the Gulf of Aden or the Gulf of Guinea, where there is a heightened risk of vessels being seized was launched today by West P&I Club.
The West Piracy Protection, which was developed in partnership with the Hamilton Global Specialty underwriting platform written by Syndicate 4000 at Lloyd’s, is tailored to provide insurance protection for piracy events where the traditional War policy coverage does not adequately indemnify clients for the typical seizure situations. This includes incidents when ships are sometimes held for just a few hours at a time.
Indemnities are provided for ransoms, including loss of transit of a ransom, and the costs of response consultants and legal experts, including reputational risk expenses. Expert support is also provided for employees directly impacted by the seizure. Additional coverage is available for Loss of Hire related to a seizure, and for a maximum period of 14 days after release of the vessel.
Embedded emergency expertise is provided by Crisis24, one of the industry’s largest exclusively retained crisis response teams, and global law firm HFW, a market leader in the specialist field of piracy response.
Richard Turner, Head of Product Development at West said: “West Piracy Protection responds to the realities of the evolving piracy threat faced by owners in such locations as the Gulf of Aden and the Gulf of Guinea. We have seen a pattern of incidents where a vessel is hijacked for just a few hours, meaning that current market wording on Loss of Hire may not be triggered, or ceases as soon as the vessel is released, with little regard for the knock-on consequences, which may include crew changes or vessel repairs.
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