The words a claim turns on

Boat owners are often told never to admit fault after a collision. The rule behind that advice is older and stricter than most wordings today. Modern liability conditions usually say that an admission, or a settlement agreed without the insurer's consent, binds the insurer only so far as the claim would have existed anyway. So a skipper who tells the other owner at the pontoon that the damage will be paid has not decided the case: the insurer still examines liability and amount for itself, and normally takes over the negotiation. What matters most is reporting the incident quickly.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does it treat an admission given without consent as a breach of duty with consequences for the payout, or only as something that does not bind the insurer? And within what deadline must a third party claim be reported?

An agreed value is a sum fixed in the policy that counts as the boat's value if she becomes a total loss, with no deduction for age. Without it the insurer works out market value on the day of the loss, meaning the value after depreciation, and for a boat ten years old that is regularly well below the sum insured. Even so, an insurer can usually challenge an agreed figure that is far above the boat's real worth, so it should reflect a realistic replacement cost, ideally backed by a surveyor's valuation.

What to check: Is the hull insured on an agreed value or a market value basis? Does the agreed value hold for the life of the policy or only for a set number of years, and how are partial losses settled?

All risks cover protects the boat against any accidental loss or damage unless the wording specifically excludes it. The opposite approach is named perils, where only the listed events are insured and anything nobody thought to list is not. The practical difference is the burden of proof, on which a disputed claim often turns: under named perils it is the owner who must show the loss fits one of the listed events, while under all risks it falls to the insurer to point to an exclusion.

What to check: Does the hull section say all risks, or does it list specific perils? If it is all risks, read the exclusions carefully, because that list now defines everything that is left out.

Assistance is the organised help around a boating incident rather than payment for the damage to the boat itself: finding a yard, storing or moving the boat, hotel nights, the journey home, an interpreter, a loan for bail abroad, a relief skipper to bring the boat back to her home berth. Hull wordings usually carry it as a separate schedule with its own limit for each service, and reimbursement is normally restricted to help the insurer arranged or agreed beforehand. A failed drive off Corsica shows the split: the hull claim is one question, getting crew and boat home is another.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: is assistance included at all or only as an optional extension, and what separate limits apply to bringing the boat home and to a relief skipper? And must the insurer's own emergency line organise the help before anything is reimbursed?

After a collision in foreign waters, a harbour authority or a court can hold the boat and demand security before it is released and the skipper is free to travel home. Local law sets the figure, the owner does not, and it falls due at once. A bail bond loan is money an insurer advances for that purpose. It stays a debt and goes back once the proceedings end or a third party reimburses it. Marine wordings differ widely on whether such an advance exists at all.

What to check: Two questions for your own wording: is security advanced abroad, and up to what figure, capped by the value of the boat or by a yearly limit? And on what terms does the money go back, interest free, or with interest once a repayment deadline has passed?

Break-in theft means someone forces a locked boat and takes what is inside, or unbolts fitted equipment such as a chartplotter, a VHF set or a wheel. It is not the same event as the theft of the whole vessel, and wordings often treat the two separately: a clause that names theft of the craft alone says nothing about a broken companionway hatch. Winter storage ashore is where it happens most, under a cover, out of season, with nobody aboard for weeks. The police normally have to be told at once, and the marina office will want the report as well.

What to check: Does the wording name break-in theft and the theft of fitted parts separately from the theft of the whole boat? What does the contract demand of winter storage ashore, a fenced and locked yard or a locked building, and is a deductible taken on a theft claim?

Cavitation occurs when vapour bubbles form around a turning propeller and collapse again moments later, each implosion driving a tiny shock into the metal. Over a season those shocks eat into the blade edges until the surface turns pitted and rough. A propeller poorly matched to the engine or a bent blade are the usual causes. The boat stops reaching its familiar revs, but the erosion itself only shows once the boat is lifted out. Because it builds up over months rather than striking at once, policy wordings place cavitation among the exclusions, next to rust, corrosion and osmosis.

What to check: Does your wording name cavitation alongside rust, corrosion and wear, and does it treat propeller damage from a grounding or a collision separately? If a machinery extension is offered, read which causes it lists, because that list is usually a closed one.

Letting other people use your boat for money, through an agency, an online platform or privately, changes the risk an insurer originally looked at. Someone nobody assessed is at the helm, and the boat goes out far more often than it would in private use. Most wordings therefore treat paid hire as something that has to be applied for and written into the policy document before the first handover, and many require a proper hire or tenancy agreement behind it. Where hire periods are insured at all, the protection is often secondary, so the hirer's own insurer is asked first.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does it allow paid hire at all, and must it be applied for and shown on the policy document before the first booking? And during a hire period, does the protection rank first or only behind the hirer's own insurance?

A marine casualty is an incident on the water, usually a collision or a grounding. An incident report records what happened, where and when, the witnesses and the damage, and is signed by both parties without any admission of liability. Photos, the log entry and positions from the plotter add weight to it. Filled in at the scene, it is the cheapest evidence there is.

What to check: Does the policy provide an incident report form, and how soon must a collision or grounding be reported? Does the wording forbid admitting liability or agreeing a settlement at the scene?

The cruising area, also called navigation limits, is the stretch of water agreed in the policy where cover applies. Sail beyond it and cover may fall away, and the area cannot be extended after the event. A passage outside the limits, such as crossing Biscay to reach the Mediterranean, needs agreeing before departure. Some policies also add exclusions for hurricane or cyclone zones.

What to check: Where exactly do the navigation limits end, and are there seasonal restrictions? Is there a hurricane or named storm clause, and does cover continue while the boat is laid up ashore, lifted or trailed?

Liability wordings for boats usually exclude damage to property that the owner has rented, leased, borrowed or taken into safekeeping, because a contract already exists with whoever owns it. The practical case is the marina: a berth, a boathouse, a cradle or a winter storage bay is rented, a gust pushes the hull against it, and the yard sends the bill the next morning. Whether that bill belongs in the liability section depends on one sentence, the exception that carves rented berths and storage back in.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does the wording name pontoons, boathouses and storage bays as an exception to the exclusion for rented property? And what limit applies to that exception per event and per insurance year?

Deliberate damage means a loss the insured person wanted to happen, rather than one caused by a lapse of attention. Setting fire to a boat, or running it aground on purpose to claim the sum insured, is the textbook case. This is the hard edge of marine wordings: gross negligence normally lets an insurer cut a payment in proportion to the fault, while intent takes the claim away completely. Intent also counts after the event. A knowingly false account of how a loss happened, or a theft left unreported on purpose, breaks the policy conditions intentionally.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does the wording keep deliberate acts and gross negligence apart, and does it state what happens to a claim in each case? And is a breach of the duties that follow a loss, such as reporting a theft, treated more harshly when it was intentional?

The excess, called a deductible in some wordings, is the part of each claim you pay yourself. Choosing a higher excess lowers the premium. Check whether it doubles in certain situations, for example theft when the boat or outboard is not kept in a locked building, and whether different sections of the policy carry different excesses.

What to check: What is the standard excess, and is it higher for theft, storm damage, or sails and rigging? Is it waived for a total loss, or when the damage was caused by a third party who was at fault?

Gross negligence is a serious failure to take the care any reasonable skipper would take: leaving a boat poorly moored when a gale is forecast, sailing without a lookout, leaving a seacock open. Many wordings then allow the insurer to reduce or refuse a claim. Whether a policy gives up that right, and how far, is the most important single difference between policy wordings, and it is rarely on the front page.

What to check: Does the wording mention gross negligence, want of due diligence or lack of reasonable care? Is there a clause waiving that defence, and up to what share of the sum insured does it apply?

A grounding is contact between the hull, keel, rudder or drive and the seabed, a rock, a sandbank or an uncharted obstruction. Many groundings end without visible damage: the boat floats off, the passage continues, and only weeks later does a crack in the laminate, a weeping keel bolt or a vibrating shaft appear. Sound practice afloat is therefore a lift-out and a yard inspection after every touch of the ground, however gentle it felt. The awkward part is the bill for that inspection when the yard finds nothing at all, because wordings differ widely on this point.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does running aground count as an insured accident in its own right, or is only the damage that follows from it paid? And is a lift-out and survey after a reported grounding paid when nothing is found, and does that report affect your no-claims discount?

A helmet bonus is a clause in personal accident wordings that raises the amount paid if the injured person can show they were wearing a helmet when the accident happened. It rewards a precaution that no insurer is able to require. Picture a rider crossing their own wake on a jetski and going over the bow head first. A helmet pays off twice: the head injury itself is smaller, and a percentage is added to whatever permanent impairment is left. Such clauses are typically tied to head injuries, to lasting impairment and to proof that the helmet was worn.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: is a helmet clause in the wording at all, and whom does it reach, anyone on board or only the person at the controls? And what proof of the helmet is expected after an accident, and what ceiling caps the extra amount?

An increase in risk means that circumstances change after the contract is signed, so that a loss becomes more likely or more costly. Typical examples afloat are chartering the boat out for money, going beyond the cruising limits named in the policy, and moving the berth from a guarded marina to an open, unattended jetty. Policy wordings normally oblige the owner to obtain consent beforehand and to report any such change as soon as it comes to light. Staying silent can be expensive, because an insurer may then cancel the contract, reprice it or cut the payout after a claim.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does it name chartering, a change of berth or leaving the cruising area as an increase in risk, and is written consent required before the change? And what deadline applies for reporting a change once you notice it?

A multilingual document proving that insurance is in force. In countries where boat insurance is compulsory, such as Croatia, Italy and Spain, marinas ask for it before allocating a berth and officials ask for it during checks afloat. A certificate in English alone can cause delays, so British owners keeping a boat in the Mediterranean are well advised to carry one in the local language too.

What to check: Is a certificate provided, in which languages, and does it show the liability limit and the boat's details exactly as registered? Can a fresh copy be obtained quickly if it is lost or checked abroad?

Protection depends on the premium actually reaching the insurer on time. If the very first instalment is not settled, the start of the contract is pushed back to the moment payment is made. If a later instalment goes unpaid, the insurer sends a written reminder setting a deadline, and a loss that happens after that deadline is typically not paid at all, even though the contract still exists on paper. A boat can therefore lie at her berth, insured in the owner's mind and uninsured in fact, because a standing order failed over the winter.

What to check: How long is the deadline the insurer has to give you in a reminder before the protection falls away, and where does your contract say so? If you pay after a notice of termination, does the contract revive, and does that also close the gap for a loss that happened in the meantime?

Legal expenses insurance for boat owners pays for the dispute, not the sum in dispute: lawyer's fees, court fees, expert witnesses and interpreters. A policy of this kind never applies to every conflict, only to the areas of law it lists, such as claims for damages, criminal and regulatory proceedings, administrative matters, contract law or a berth agreement. Example: another boat hits your transom while you are leaving harbour, the other side denies the sequence of events and the yard's invoice stays half paid. Whoever sues then has to advance the costs of the proceedings.

What to check: Which areas of law does your policy actually list, and is the dispute you are likely to have included, over a purchase, a repair or a berth? And where does the cover apply: within Europe and the Mediterranean only, or beyond, and up to what amount and for how long a stay?

A confirmation to a bank or finance house financing the boat that it will receive the settlement if a claim is paid. Lenders regularly require it for a marine mortgage, a boat loan or a lease, and many ask for fresh proof each year. When the boat is sold or refinanced, the note on the policy has to be updated or removed.

What to check: Is the lender named on the schedule as loss payee, and what happens if the policy lapses? Does the insurer have to notify the lender before cover is cancelled or changed?

The limit of indemnity is the most the liability section will pay for damage or injury you cause to others. Look beyond the headline figure to any sub limit per injured person: some policies quote ten million in total and then cap personal injury at three million per person. Marina contracts in the UK and around the Mediterranean often set a minimum third party limit, so the figure also decides where you may berth.

What to check: What is the overall limit, and is there a lower limit per person or per event? Does the figure meet the minimum in the marina contract and in the countries you plan to visit?

Hull wordings almost always exclude mechanical breakdown: wear, a seized bearing, a short circuit, a material fault in the part that actually failed. The engine that dies on a flat calm day is therefore the classic uninsured loss, and a gearbox rebuild is never cheap. A machinery extension buys that exclusion back for the main engine, the gearbox, the shaft, the propeller and the auxiliary sets. Clauses of this kind normally carry an age limit for the machinery and a documented maintenance condition.

What to check: Does the wording exclude mechanical breakdown, and is a machinery extension actually named in the schedule? What age limit applies to the machinery, which service records will be asked for after a claim, and does the extension answer for operating error and a broken shaft?

Market value is what the boat was worth on the day of the loss: the replacement cost less deductions for age, wear and condition. Some policies apply a fixed scale by age, for example 80 percent of new value from the second year and 50 percent from the fifth. On older boats it is often this figure that decides whether a claim leaves the owner out of pocket.

What to check: Is a total loss settled at agreed value or at market value? If market value, how is it established, and does a depreciation scale apply to sails, engines or the whole boat?

Misappropriation means that someone who was lawfully holding the boat decides to keep her. The difference from theft lies at the beginning, not at the end. Forcing a lock at night is theft. Borrowing a boat for a weekend, chartering her for a season or taking her in for repair and then failing to return her is misappropriation. To the owner the berth looks just as empty either way, but in law these are two different events, and hull wordings treat them separately.

What to check: Does your hull wording name misappropriation, fraud or breach of trust separately from theft, and on what terms? What happens if the person who fails to return the boat is someone you entrusted her to, such as a yard or a charter agent?

A named perils policy contains a closed list of insured events, such as fire, storm, sinking, stranding and theft. Anything that is not on the list is not insured, however reasonable the claim may seem and even if nobody ever considered it. This approach is common in restricted hull covers and in entry level policies, where a lower premium buys a narrower promise.

What to check: Is there a list of perils in the hull section? Look for gaps that matter where the boat is kept, for example damage while ashore, during lifting, or accidental damage that happens without any storm.

When a repair puts a new part in place of an old one, the boat is worth more afterwards than before. Many hull wordings deduct an amount for that gain, usually on a scale that grows with the age of the item. Sails, covers, upholstery, electronics and engines are the parts most often affected. Example: a twelve year old genoa splits in a squall. The bill buys a new sail that will last far longer than the old one, and depending on the wording part of that bill stays with the owner.

What to check: Does your hull wording apply a new for old deduction to partial damage, and does a scale by age of the item appear in the policy schedule? Ask which parts it reaches: sails, covers, upholstery, electronics and the engine are the usual candidates.

A restriction that limits theft cover at night, often to the hours between 8 in the morning and 8 in the evening, or ties it to the boat being kept in a locked building. In practice it mostly affects personal watercraft and trailer rigs left overnight in a car park, for example on the way to a slipway or a ferry port.

What to check: Is there a night-time clause, which hours does it define, and does it apply to the boat, the trailer or only to personal watercraft? What counts as a secure place overnight?

A no claims discount reduces the premium for years without a claim and can be cut back after a claim. Some insurers have dropped the system altogether and always apply the full discount, which is simpler and works out cheaper after a claim. Owners moving from another insurer are often asked for written proof of their claims history before a discount is granted.

What to check: How far is the discount reduced after one claim, and after a second? Can the discount be protected, and does a claim where you were not at fault still count against it?

Osmosis is water absorbed into the laminate of a GRP hull, leading to blistering. It is a gradual ageing process, not a sudden event, which is why practically every policy wording excludes it, along with rust, corrosion and wear and tear. A pre-purchase survey with moisture readings is the usual way to find out before buying.

What to check: Does the exclusion cover only osmosis itself, or also damage connected with it? How does the wording treat damage from an insured event, such as a grounding, on a hull that already shows osmosis?

Cover is contingent, or excess of other insurance, when it only applies to the extent that no other insurer pays. That sounds harmless but changes the order of events: the other policy has to be examined and decline first, and that takes time. It is common in skipper liability and charterer's cover, where the charter company's own insurance usually responds first.

What to check: Does any add-on cover say it applies only in excess of other insurance? If two policies could respond, which pays first, and who deals with the claim while that is being decided?

Items on board that are not part of the boat: clothing, binoculars, tablets, fishing tackle. Policies often include them at no extra premium, up to a percentage of the sum insured or a fixed amount, and higher values can usually be added. Home contents insurance may cover some items on a boat as well, so it is worth comparing both before the season.

What to check: What is the limit for personal effects, is there a single item limit, and are valuables, cash or diving equipment excluded? Does theft from an unattended boat require signs of forced entry?

Obligations the policyholder must meet to keep cover intact: giving accurate information when applying, reporting a loss without delay, taking reasonable steps to limit the damage and keeping to any agreed security requirements. Some wordings draft them as warranties or conditions precedent. A breach can cost all or part of a claim, so they deserve the same attention as the cover itself.

What to check: Which conditions must be met before a claim is paid? Look for deadlines to report a loss, whether repairs need approval first, and any requirement to hold a qualification such as an RYA certificate or the ICC.

Spilled fuel, oil in the marina basin, a clean-up of a harbour or river ordered by the authorities. This damage affects third parties and the public rather than your boat, so it belongs under liability, and the bill can exceed any hull value. Harbour authorities can recover the cost of containment and cleaning from the owner responsible.

What to check: Does the liability limit apply in full to pollution, or is there a lower sub limit? Are clean-up costs ordered by an authority included, and does gradual leakage count as well as a sudden spill?

Before a policy is issued, the proposer has to answer the insurer's written questions fully and truthfully: engine power, year of build, berth, cruising area, earlier damage and repairs. An answer that is wrong or left incomplete gives the insurer the right to withdraw from the contract, to cancel it, or to rewrite the terms with retrospective effect. Example: a hull repair from an earlier season that went unmentioned can surface years afterwards, following a grounding, and turn a claim into an argument about the proposal form instead of the damage.

What to check: Check which questions the proposal form actually put to you in writing, because only those count. Check how long the insurer may rely on a breach once it learns of one, and whether it warned you of the consequences in writing beforehand.

A premium adjustment is a change to the price of a policy that is already running, while the cover itself stays the same. It does not follow one owner's own claims record. Instead the insurer recalculates the rate for a whole group of comparable risks, so a run of storm years that drains the market's claims funds can lift the price for every boat in that group, including one that has never been damaged. Most conditions set a threshold, often five per cent, below which nothing moves, and they allow the policyholder a short window to cancel when the price rises while the cover stays put.

What to check: Does your policy allow the premium to be adjusted for a whole portfolio, and what threshold has to be passed before it may rise? If it does rise while the cover stays unchanged, how many days do you have to cancel, and from what date does the cancellation take effect?

Selling an insured boat raises a question many owners ask too late: what happens to the running policy? Under German insurance contract law a hull contract does not simply lapse. The buyer steps into the existing contract as soon as ownership passes and takes on its rights and duties, while both sides gain a short window in which they may give notice. Liability wordings often work the other way around and end the contract on the day of the sale. Either way the sale has to be reported to the insurer in writing without delay, because a claim that follows an unreported sale can be turned down.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: when you sell, does the policy pass to the buyer, or does it end on the day ownership changes hands? And in what form and within what deadline must the sale be reported before a later claim may be refused?

Salvage and towage cover the cost of recovering, towing and securing a boat after a casualty. These costs come on top of the damage to the boat itself and can exceed it, especially in remote cruising grounds without local infrastructure. A salvor working under a salvage agreement such as Lloyd's Open Form can claim an award based on the value saved, which is why the limit in the policy matters.

What to check: Are salvage costs paid within the sum insured or in addition to it, and is there a separate limit? Does the policy ask the owner to contact the insurer before signing a salvage agreement?

Salvage means lifting or pulling free a boat that has sunk, gone aground or lost all steerage. Wreck removal means taking away and disposing of whatever is left afterwards. Both can cost more than the boat was worth: a crane, a dive team and a pontoon in a crowded basin add up fast, and a port authority can order the berth cleared without asking the owner first. Hull policies treat that bill in very different ways, and the difference only becomes visible once the invoice arrives.

What to check: Two questions for your own policy. Is salvage, wreck removal and disposal insured on top of the sum insured, or does the same amount have to pay for both the boat and the clean-up? And does the cover apply only once an authority orders the removal, or also when the owner arranges it?

The cost of searching for and helping people in distress: lifeboats, helicopters, other vessels called to assist. It is a separate item and not to be confused with salvage, which is about the boat, whereas search and rescue is about people. Lifeboat crews in the UK and Ireland do not charge for saving lives, but abroad private rescue and assistance services may send an invoice.

What to check: Is there a limit for search and rescue costs, and in which section of the policy does it sit? Does it apply only to the rescue of people, or also to assistance for the boat?

Conditions that must be met for theft to be insured: a locked building, a fenced compound, a fitted immobiliser, a hitch lock on the trailer. If a requirement is not met, the insurer may refuse the claim or the excess may double. Such requirements tend to be strictest for outboards, personal watercraft and boats kept on a trailer.

What to check: Which security measures are required, and do they apply at all times or only when the boat is unattended? Is a specific approved immobiliser, tracker or outboard lock named in the wording?

Skipper's liability is the third party cover that applies to a person in charge of a boat they do not own, typically a chartered yacht. It responds to injury or damage caused to other people and their property, not to damage to the charter yacht itself, which is what the security deposit and the charter company's hull policy are for. An example: while berthing in a Croatian marina the charter yacht crushes a finger pontoon and dents the boat alongside. The pontoon and the neighbouring boat belong to skipper's liability; the yacht stays with the deposit.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: is the charter skipper extension tied to a charter agreement in your own name, a maximum charter duration and a narrower cruising range than the main cover? And what is the sum insured for it, and does it sit below the sum insured for your own boat?

Boat policies commonly tie protection to the person at the helm holding whatever licence the authorities require for that craft and that stretch of water. What counts is the official requirement, not personal experience: a sailor of forty years without the certificate the coastal state demands can still fall foul of the clause. Wordings differ sharply. Some bite only where the helmsman was both unqualified and unlicensed, others ignore competence altogether and look purely at the missing paper.

What to check: Which licence does the policy demand, and does it spell that out by craft, engine power and waters, or only by country of registration? And does a missing certificate alone trigger the clause, or must the person steering also have been unfit to handle the boat?

Subrogation is the insurer's right, once it has paid a claim, to recover the money from whoever caused the loss. It works in both directions: if your insurer pays and someone else was to blame, it pursues them, and another owner's insurer can equally come after you. That is why third party liability cover matters more than hull cover: a recovery claim for someone else's yacht can be far larger than the value of your own boat.

What to check: Does the liability section defend claims that seem unjustified, including legal costs, and does that apply abroad? Does the policy give up recovery against family members or crew using the boat with permission?

Sue and labour costs are what you spend to prevent or reduce a loss, such as pumping out, extra mooring lines or a tow into shelter. As a general principle an insurer reimburses them once an insured loss has happened or is immediately threatened, but not before. That is why lifting a boat out as a precaution ahead of a forecast storm is generally not recoverable, even when it is the sensible thing to do.

What to check: Does the wording include a sue and labour clause, is it paid in addition to the sum insured, and when do costs count as reasonable? Does it ask the owner to contact the insurer before larger measures?

The value you declare for the boat and her equipment. It sets the upper limit of what the hull section will pay and forms the basis of the premium. Set it too low and you are underinsured; set it too high and you pay premium on value that does not exist. A surveyor's valuation or recent asking prices for similar boats give a sound starting point.

What to check: Which items are included in the sum insured: sails, rigging, tender, trailer, fixed electronics? How are upgrades made during the year added, and what does a mid-term change cost?

After damage to a boat, someone has to establish what is broken, what caused it and what the repair will cost. That work is done by a marine surveyor, and the fee is rarely small. Who ends up paying it is normally decided before the survey rather than after it. Many hull wordings reimburse a survey only where the insurer commissioned it or agreed to it in advance, so a report ordered privately at the travel lift on a Saturday can stay with the owner. In liability and legal expenses wordings the logic differs again, because expert fees sit inside the costs of pursuing a claim.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does it reimburse a survey only when the insurer commissioned it or approved it beforehand, and whom do you call before instructing anyone? And in a liability claim, are expert fees paid in addition to the sum insured or taken out of it?

A tender is the small boat that a larger one carries: the dinghy towed astern, the RIB on the foredeck, the inflatable that ferries people ashore from an anchorage. Policy wordings define it narrowly. It serves to move crew and guests between boat and shore, or to rescue others at sea, and it may only travel a limited distance from the mother vessel. Take it off fishing on its own while the yacht lies at anchor in the bay and you have left that definition behind. Hull wordings also tend to treat the tender as a separate item carrying its own sum insured.

What to check: Is the tender listed separately in the schedule, with a sum insured of its own, and does the outboard engine belong to that item? How far may it travel from the mother vessel, and does liability protection still apply when it goes off alone?

Many owners assume a boat contract can only end on its renewal date. German and Austrian wordings usually say otherwise: once a claim has been settled, both the policyholder and the insurer may end the contract early. The deadline is short, and it runs not from the calendar year but from the moment the claim file is closed, typically one month after payment, after a refusal, or after the loss investigation ends. Until the notice takes effect, the contract continues unchanged. Notice must be given in writing, and a letter or an email is enough.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: after a settled claim, how long does each side have to give notice, and what starts that clock, the payment, a refusal or the close of the investigation? And when does the insurer's notice take effect, on arrival or a month later?

Theft of individual items rather than the whole boat: outboard engine, electronics, tender, liferaft. Restricted hull covers regularly exclude it and insure only the theft of the entire vessel. Outboards and portable electronics are quick to remove and easy to sell, which makes them attractive on moorings and in boatyards.

What to check: Is theft of parts insured, including outboards, tenders and removable electronics? Are there extra conditions, such as the outboard being locked to the transom or taken ashore when the boat is left?

A total loss means the boat is beyond saving, or that repairing it would cost more than the vessel is worth. Wordings normally split this in two: destruction, where the wreck still exists and can be surveyed, and a total loss with no prospect of recovery, after a sinking in deep water or a theft. Then comes the question that decides the payment: does the contract settle at the sum insured written into it, or at the market value on the day of the loss? On a boat twelve years old the gap between those two figures can run into tens of thousands. Salvage proceeds are usually deducted.

What to check: Two questions for the contract at hand: at a total loss, is the payment the agreed sum insured or the depreciated market value, and is an age limit or a proof of replacement attached to it? And is the deductible still taken off when the boat is a total loss?

A tracking device is a small transmitter fitted on board that reports the boat's position over the mobile network or by satellite. After a theft it is often the only reason a boat comes back: the trailer is pulled off the slipway overnight, by morning the app shows it in a yard two hundred kilometres away, and the police drive out. The unit cuts both ways. Declaring a tracker often improves the terms on offer, but it also creates a duty, because many wordings treat the installation as a disclosed material circumstance and want proof after a claim that the device was fitted and switched on.

What to check: Two questions for your own contract: does the wording ask you to declare a tracking device, and does it want proof that the device was fitted and working? And is a reduction of the settlement stated for the case that this proof cannot be produced?

Underinsurance arises when the sum insured is lower than the boat's real value. The insurer may then reduce the settlement in proportion, a principle known as average, and this applies to partial losses too. Insure for 60,000 when the figure should be 100,000, and a claim for 10,000 of damage pays only 6,000.

What to check: Does the wording contain an average clause, and is there any margin before it applies? Does it apply to partial losses as well as to a total loss?

An underwriting agent (often called an MGA or coverholder) is an intermediary holding wide authority from an insurer: it issues policies, examines claims and settles them itself, rather than simply passing paperwork along. The insurer carrying the risk remains the insurer, and it is the insurer whose money pays a claim. For the owner this can mean that the people who wrote the policy are the same people who decide the claim.

What to check: Which insurer actually carries the risk, and is it named on the schedule? Does the underwriting agent have authority to settle claims, and who should be contacted first after an incident?

Almost every marine wording sets aside a group of catastrophe risks that no premium can carry: war, civil war and warlike events, riot and civil commotion, strike, terrorist or political violence, nuclear energy, and confiscation, seizure or any other act of a state authority. Such events reach hundreds of boats at once, which is why they sit outside ordinary hull, liability and accident wordings rather than inside them. Example: a port authority chains your yacht during a customs investigation and she lies unusable at the pontoon for a season. That is an act of state, not a hull claim.

What to check: Does your wording name confiscation, seizure and other acts of a state authority separately from war, or does it only mention war? If a personal accident section belongs to your contract, does it keep the usual exception for a traveller caught out by war abroad, and for how many days does that exception run?

Harbour authorities and other public bodies can order a wreck to be removed. These costs are a separate item and arise on top of the settlement for the boat, even when she has already been paid out as a total loss. Marina contracts commonly make the owner responsible for removing a sunken boat from the berth.

What to check: Is wreck removal included, under hull or under liability, and is it paid in addition to the sum insured? Does the cover still apply after the boat has been settled as a total loss?