When was the last time you had an insurance review of your swine facilities? I thought of this today after stepping into 1” of water in my basement on my way to my office early this morning. We had a sump pump failure sometime in the last 2 days and our entire basement was under water.
When my wife called our insurance agent, we received the good news that we were covered for water in our basement if the sump pump failed. My wife reminded me of our discussion a few years ago with our local agent where he brought up the topic and encouraged us to add this rider to our home owners policy. As I listen to the vacuum pumps and dehumidifiers of ServiceMaster I’m thankful for the policy review with our local agent.
What about your insurance for your swine enterprise? As many readers know I’ve been speaking around the country on the topic of ‘We Kill Too Many Pigs by Our Mistakes’. Whether the pigs die from hyperthermia in the event of a ventilation failure or from a hydrogen sulfide spike during pit pumping, the financial consequences are large. If you loose a room of 1000-1200 grow-finish pigs because of a power failure, the loss is close to $200,000 today.
If you have suffocation insurance, have you discussed with your agent what the record keeping requirements are in order to file a claim? In the past 2 months I’ve been with several producers who weren’t fully aware of the necessity of maintaining a month written log of generator and transfer switch testing that was a part of their suffocation insurance requirements. A quick call to their insurance agent during my visit confirmed this necessity.
The same type of attention to detail may be warranted for your structural insurance. Does your insurance cover disposal and clean up expense? In many states, the environmental quality division of state government (DEQ or DNR or EQC or ?) may have extensive requirements associated with the removal of material following a disaster.
While none of us want an insured event to occur, it sure felt good to hear our agent tell us we were covered for the cleanup expense this morning. A careful review of your coverage may allow you to feel the same way in the event of a loss.