Active Shooter Insurance (also known as Active Assailant Coverage) 

High-profile mass shootings over the last decade in various public and private settings and various attacks involving vehicles have often been carried out with the sole intent of instilling public fear while causing as much loss of life as possible.

Although traditional forms of insurance coverage can provide a measure of protection for businesses and employees that are targeted in such attacks, their language can be ambiguous — and may have sizable gaps.

To address any potential coverage gaps, several leading insurers have developed new forms of coverage dedicated to responding to active assailant threats, helping organizations that are victims of such attacks to mitigate their risk and recover following them.

Standard Coverage Grants:

Physical damage

– If there is a physical loss and property is damaged in the active shooter event, this coverage will respond to help repair the owned property.  This repair may include physical security upgrades at the building.

Legal liability / litigation

– Insureds are legally obligated to pay for certain damages and claim expenses that arise from an active shooter / workplace violence incident. Organizations today are being held to a higher standard of accountability than in the past when it comes the “duty of care” they have towards customers and employees and the public safety measures they’re obliged to uphold. Those who fall short of this “duty of care” are at risk of being sued.

Crisis management

– Insurance carriers will indemnify the insured for specialist crisis response and consultant fees resulting solely and directly from an active shooter or threat event. This might include helping insureds deal with public relations, reassuring families and employees and reinforcing the company branding.

Business interruption coverage

– Insureds can get indemnity for physical loss, damage or destruction of an insured property, or denials of access to an insured location resulting in business income losses.

Medical expenses, funeral expenses, and death benefit

– Policies enable insureds to help the victims of an active assailant / active shooter event by providing a supportive response to the trauma. This might also include psychiatric counseling for the victim traumatized by the event.

Loss of attraction

– An active shooter event can stigmatize a neighborhood, business district or a brand. Active shooter insurance can sometimes help with brand rehabilitation and can fill in some revenue gaps, even if the incident didn’t happen at the insured’s own business.

Who should buy active shooter insurance coverage?

Random acts of violence are not limited to one state, one industry sector or one cause. Fatalities occur across various industries and geographies with a variety of weapons. While Churches and Schools appear to be the main target of these attacks, given the rate that these terrible events occur, we recommend that anyone with an office or a retail location carry an Active Shooter insurance policy.  Unfortunately, this product tends to be a reactionary purchase after something horrible has shocked either themselves or other companies closely related to them.

At the very least, you should implement an Active Shooter response plan to protect your employees as this is the very standard set forth by OSHA’s General Duty Clause. There are a number of resources available through the Homeland Security site to begin to formulate an Active Shooter response plan.

About CMR | PolicySmart®

PolicySmart’s risk management consultants provide independent group benefit, retirement and commercial insurance advice by reviewing your current portfolio of policies to improve coverage and reduce cost. By using our proprietary database – The CMR Database® (comprising some 13,000 brokers and specialists globally), we maximize access to the insurance and retirement industry providing greater options that will translate to better coverage and lower cost.

Please email croche@policysmart.app or call 888-873-1982 or 212-447-4300 for more information.  www.policysmart.app