How does one know how reliable insurance underwriters are? We're
offshore cruisers, so we need international coverage on our boat. Our
current policy costs more than 4% of the agreed value of our boat, but
it's from Pantaenius, which we believe to be reliable. We looked
around for a more reasonable quote and got one from Yachtlink -- just
over 2% of agreed value. Trouble is, the underwriters appear to be a
Russian company called Sogaz. This isn't very reassuring, and it's
not clear to us how we would ever hold them to honor a claim. Does
the fact that the broker is in California help us, legally? Is there
any way to determine whether specific underwriters honor their
obligations?

On Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:18:23 -0700, Akka
wrote:

How does one know how reliable insurance underwriters are? We're
offshore cruisers, so we need international coverage on our boat. Our
current policy costs more than 4% of the agreed value of our boat, but
it's from Pantaenius, which we believe to be reliable. We looked
around for a more reasonable quote and got one from Yachtlink -- just
over 2% of agreed value. Trouble is, the underwriters appear to be a
Russian company called Sogaz. This isn't very reassuring, and it's
not clear to us how we would ever hold them to honor a claim. Does
the fact that the broker is in California help us, legally? Is there
any way to determine whether specific underwriters honor their
obligations?

Contact Al Golden, president of IMIS at

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news...6/17/29894.htm

Thanks! This looks really good,and we'll pursue it. This appears to
be underwritten by an American company, so we guess that protects us.

Rob

On Jul 30, 11:02 pm, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:18:23 -0700, Akka
wrote:

How does one know how reliable insurance underwriters are? We're
offshore cruisers, so we need international coverage on our boat. Our
current policy costs more than 4% of the agreed value of our boat, but
it's from Pantaenius, which we believe to be reliable. We looked
around for a more reasonable quote and got one from Yachtlink -- just
over 2% of agreed value. Trouble is, the underwriters appear to be a
Russian company called Sogaz. This isn't very reassuring, and it's
not clear to us how we would ever hold them to honor a claim. Does
the fact that the broker is in California help us, legally? Is there
any way to determine whether specific underwriters honor their
obligations?

Contact Al Golden, president of IMIS at

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news...6/17/29894.htm

On Thu, 02 Aug 2007 07:51:04 -0700, Akka
wrote:

Thanks! This looks really good,and we'll pursue it. This appears to
be underwritten by an American company, so we guess that protects us.

Markel and IMIS have both been around for a while and are being used
by other serious cruisers.