Photography: The Luxury Signature
I'm sure the thought has crossed your mind – insuring your wedding in the event something goes horribly wrong. Should you, for peace of mind, or leave everything to chance?
Already popular in the US and UK, Singapore is just climbing on the bandwagon. Damian Yong, content manager for Pacific Insurance brokers, says the company started Wedding Insurance in January 2015 and are currently the only ones offering this.
Since the company was already selling event insurance, they decided to focus on weddings. "We proposed to the underwriters to look into tweaking certain limits and to underwrite certain additional covers to suit a wedding policy. With the increasing number of marriages in 2014 and 2015 being the SG50 year of 'handouts' and celebrations, we felt that this would be an ideal time to roll out such a policy." Prior to this, he says, there had been an earlier policy from NTUC, that did not seem to have been popular and it was dropped from the company's products.
Among the things that can be covered, are wedding attire (the gown, obviously, and the suit, as well as bridesmaids dresses and groomsmen's outfits) as well as wedding gifts. But this doesn't mean the policy holders can just roll up and claim "ang pow box and contents" — they have to present documentation (examples given include a careful log book signed and dated). The policy also covers damage to guests such when a waiter accidentally spills hot tea and burns them or if the stage collapses and hurts them. "It doesn't cover a guest dancing too hard and hurting his foot, for instance," says he.
The equipment used for the event (hired and owned) is covered; as well as service providers such as caterers, photo and bridal studios if they happen to go bankrupt before the event — but in the case of services, says Yong, that means reimbursing policy holders for their deposit. "It either reimburses supplier deposits or pays for additional cost inured to seek out a new caterer/supplier depending on the situation or loss, but not both.
"The basic policy starts from $450 but the premium will increase depending on the type of cover required and details of the wedding such as venue, total budget, number of guests, photo shoot locations and so on," says Yong. Visit Pacific Insurance and fill in the form, and one of the 30 or so staff will call you as soon as possible to discuss specifics and give you a quote. Yong says, "We've had quite a few inquiries already, but you know? Some people have this misconception about insurance and think they can use this to profit, but what we do it try to mitigate or reduce the financial impact on you if something goes wrong!"
