|
Protection and indemnity insurance, more commonly known as "P&I" insurance, is a form of mutual maritime insurance provided by a P&I Club.〔The Mariner's Guide to Marine Insurance - P Anderson - 1999 - Nautical Institute - ISBN 1870077539〕 Whereas a marine insurance company provides "hull and machinery" cover for shipowners, and cargo cover for cargo owners, a P&I Club provides cover for open-ended risks that traditional insurers are reluctant to insure. Typical P&I cover includes: a carrier's third-party risks for damage cause to cargo during carriage;〔Marine Cargo Insurance - John Dunt - 2009 - Informa - ISBN 9781843117636〕 war risks;〔Marine War Risks - Michael D Miller - 1994 - Lloyds - ISBN 1850445168〕 and risks of environmental damage such as oil spills and pollution. In the UK, both traditional underwriters and P&I clubs are subject to the Marine Insurance Act 1906. A P&I Club is a mutual insurance association that provides risk pooling, information and representation for its members. Unlike a marine insurance company, which reports to its shareholders, a P&I club reports only to its members. Originally, P&I Club members were typically ship-owners, ship-operators or demise charterers, but more recently freight forwarders and warehouse operators have been able to join. Whereas the assured pays a premium to an underwriter for cover which lasts for a particular time (say, a year, or a voyage), a P&I Club member instead pays a "call". This is a sum of money that is put into the Club's pool, a kind of "kitty". If, at the end of the year, there are still funds in the pool, each member will pay a reduced call the following year; but if the Club has made a major payout (say, after an oil spillage) club members will immediately have to pay a further call to replenish the pool. There is an International Group of P&I Clubs based at Peek House, London.〔The Jackson Parton Miscellany - 2nd ed - 2012 page 77 - www.jacksonparton.com〕 These Clubs cooperate to provide funds in the event of huge claims using a complex system to determine liability. == History == The ancient Greeks created the practice of General Average in Rhodos island, and ancient Romans could be said to have had a rudimentary form of marine insurance. However, a novel type of insurance that one would recognise as modern emerged in the London "coffee shops" in the 19th century. Shipowners and charterers would seek underwriters to insure their ships, and cargo owners (whether shippers, importers or consignees) would insure their cargoes. Carriers soon realised that often they might themselves be at fault should cargo be lost or damaged at sea, and they sought to take out third-party indemnity insurance in respect of cargo liability. Underwriters evinced an unwillingness to take on such open-ended risks, so ship-owners responded by forming their own mutual P&I Clubs, acting as a shipowner's co-operative. An advantage was that a Club worked for the shipowners, thereby eliminating the underwriters' profit margins and making P&I Insurance significantly cheaper.〔Law of Marine Insurance - Susan Hodges -Cavendish Publishing - 2001 - ISBN 1-85941-227-0 - pp 323-326〕 In the second half of the 19th century, the number of claims greatly increased due to the number of passengers emigrating to North America and Australia. Ship-owners became aware of their insurers' compensation limits, especially when it came to damages caused by ship collisions. While the UK Merchant Shipping Act 1854 had determined that, when evaluating insurance claims, the value of ships should be no less than £15 per ton, (many ships had an actual lower market value ) and existing insurance policies did not cover this gap in liability. The compensation for collision damages also excluded a quarter of such damages. Existing hull insurance policies included damages to the insured ship and liability for the damages it had caused, while the maximum amount ship-owners could recover after collisions was the ship's insured value. injured crew members might seek compensation from their employers. Later, the Fatal Accidents Act 1846 made it easier for passengers or their survivors to file claims. Also, injured crew members might seek compensation from their employers. Perhaps the first protection association, the Shipowners' Mutual Protection Society, was formed in 1855. It was intended to compensate for loss of life, injuries and collisions that were excluded from marine insurance policies beyond the monetary limit of these policies. Similar associations were later formed within the United Kingdom, in Scandinavia, Japan and the United States. In 1874, the risk of liability for cargo carried by the insured ship was added to the insurance cover provided by a P&I club. Cargo value had risen and cargo underwriters, encouraged by UK courts, filed more claims to recover their losses from ship-owners. These claims were not covered by the current marine insurance class. After 1874, many clubs added a marine indemnity class to respond to these new claims. This class was later merged with the marine insurance class reserved for the original protection risks and the distinction between the two classes virtually disappeared. After the Torrey Canyon grounding in 1967, covering the liabilities, costs and expenses of oil spills became an increasingly important aspect of P&I insurance. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Protection and indemnity insurance」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|