NSW-based Precision Underwriting is to offer abuse insurance to care facilities, leisure clubs, school camp operators and other organisations after a new binder with UK-based Beazley incepted on Monday. 

In May, Beazley launched Safeguard Australia, which provides abuse insurance as well as prevention and crisis response services. It is suitable for education, not for profit, transportation, healthcare, religious institution and leisure sectors, among others. 

The cover fills a gap left after private insurers largely walked away from providing physical and sexual abuse cover, and Catholic Church Insurance collapsed.  

Precision Senior Underwriter Paul Douglas tells insuranceNEWS.com.au the reduced appetite “left a massive hole and Beazley have provided a product to fill that hole”. The agency is already getting three new quote requests daily, he says. 

“They've decided to go with Precision Underwriting as the only coverholder in Australia. It is the first binder being granted in Australia and will make cover more affordable to smaller organisations, sporting clubs and businesses in general,” he said. 

“We embrace the risk management - understanding it's about the prevention of abuse that goes hand in hand with making it a sustainable product. We embrace that more so than some of the competition. 

“This model is what Beazley has done successfully in the US, and they bought it over here to do the same fashion in Australia.” 

While accessing the Safeguard product in Australia via Beazley’s London market platform comes with a minimum $25,000 premium, the arrangement with Precision allows smaller operations such as sports clubs and school camp operators to quickly access cover. 

“We haven’t got our binder rates yet - we've just signed off a binder and they're finalising Australia. 

“They’ve got binders in the US that are operating at similar sort of style where they might come down to $US2000 ($2982). Our minimum right now doing an open market is $10,000 and we hope to at least halve that, probably down to maybe $2500,” Mr Douglas said. 

Beazley has deemed the largely abandoned niche viable due to stringent risk mitigation requirements, Mr Douglas says, with screening and selection toolkits when employing, online webinars, and crisis management should an incident occur that could potentially lead to a claim.  

“The resources that they provide are brilliant. It's all round prevention of abuse training, and then providing resources to help you in the event of an incident,” he said. "They'll eventually get reductions in premium for taking on all those procedures.”