Photographer Insurance

What Type of Photographer Insurance Do I Need?

Depending on your photography business’s exact needs, your insurance could include a variety of policies that help protect your business. Here are three policies that we suggest you look into when insuring your photography business:

General Liability Insurance

Coverage for third-party accidents, property damage, and bodily injury. This policy is the most common type of insurance for many small businesses.

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Equipment and Business Property Insurance

Also known as Inland Marine insurance, this coverage can financially protect equipment and inventory that is in transport or stored off-site.

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Workers’ Compensation Insurance

Coverage to help take care of employees who get sick or injured on the job. Many states require this for businesses with full or part-time employees.

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Professional Liability Insurance

Coverage for damages and legal costs due to mistakes or negligence claims. This policy is often recommended for businesses that provide advice and guidance to their clients.

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Insurance can be complicated. But whether you’re browsing our site or talking to one of our agents, you’ll quickly discover that we’re pretty down-to-earth about insurance.

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Benefits of Professional Photography Insurance

• It can protect your photography business from certain claims.
• It can cover damages caused by your negligence.
• Proof of insurance can help customers feel good about your photography.
• It may be legally required where you’re located

Depending on your photography business’s exact needs, your insurance could include a variety of policies that help protect your photography business. Here are three policies that we suggest you look into when insuring your photography business:

Commercial General Liability Insurance
Commercial general liability (GL) insurance for photographers covers costs associated with third-party accidents, property damage, and bodily injury. General liability insurance can also cover some of your photography equipment if it is stolen or damaged while you’re working.
Without general liability insurance for photographers, you and your photography business could be responsible for covering the costs of risks that you face with owning and running a photography business. The average claim for small business accidents or property damage is $30,000. That kind of money could sink your photography business, so a general liability policy is definitely worth the protection.

Here’s an example of how general liability insurance for photographers can protect a photography business:

You’re doing a photo shoot for a hotel’s new website and bring props along with you for the shoot. One of the hotel guests trips and falls over one of your props and injures their arm. The guest sues the hotel and your photography business, asking for reimbursement of their medical expenses and for the days they missed from work recuperating.
Without a general liability policy, the money the guest is suing for would come out of your personal funds. Luckily, a general liability insurance for photographers policy would help cover the guest’s medical coverage and lost wages, as well as additional fees (such as the fees you paid your lawyer for help sorting everything out and possibly defending you in court).

Professional Liability Insurance
As a photographer, there are a lot of moving pieces in your photography business that you can’t control the weather, the light, what kind of mood your subject is in that day. What happens if it rains the day you’re supposed to shoot a wedding and the not-so-happy couple wants a partial refund because they got only indoor photos taken? That’s where professional liability insurance for photographers comes in!

Photographer professional liability insurance for photographers covers your photography business if your client claims that you or one of your photography employees were negligent in providing your professional services. We know that insurance language can be mind-boggling, so let’s take a look at professional liability in action.

Say you did a boudoir photo shoot for a client. Things seemed to go well during the shoot, but after the edits are finished, you accidentally send the final versions to the wrong client with a similar name. Your original client finds out and is humiliated that their photos were delivered to the wrong person. They decide to sue your photography business for mental anguish.

Professional liability insurance can protect your and your photography business’s finances if you’re sued for a mistake you made while working. Small business owners don’t intend to make mistakes, but they do happen from time to time. Because photography can expose you to risks — especially because you’re working closely with clients — it is recommended for photography business owners.
Here’s a brief recap on what professional liability can cover:

• Negligence or alleged negligence
• Legal defense costs
• Omissions or alleged omissions
• Copyright infringement
• Claims and damages
• And more

Photographers’s PL Usually Doesn’t Cover:

• Intentional acts and omissions
• Property damage
• Medical expenses
• Bodily injury
• False advertising
• Employment matters
• Patents and trade secrets

How will Photography Insurance impact my business?

Starting a photography business isn’t easy. It’s not as if you simply take a smartphone and digital camera, shoot a photo, and send it to a client. To get the big picture (pun intended!), you have to zoom out to see the many moving parts that go into building a successful business: a quality camera and associated equipment (lighting, props, etc.), marketing materials, a sales strategy, and more.cc
It takes a chunk of money to acquire and build those things in a way that sets you up for growth, so it’s understandable that you’d want to cut costs where you can. In the case of photography insurance, though, that’s quite the risk.
What you pay for a monthly photographer insurance premium is well worth the protection against what you could pay if a claim were to be filed against you. Small business owners pay amounts that could put their personal and family finances in jeopardy. The average costs for some claims include:
$30,000 for property damage or accident claims $39,000 for work injury claims $50,000 for reputational harm claims (e.g., in cases of slander or libel) $20,000 for a client slip-and-fall caseWith these prices, claims may seem rare, but they’re surprisingly common: 43% of small business owners have been involved in some kind of civil suit.
A client doesn’t necessarily need a valid reason to make a claim against your photography business. Whether or not you made a mistake, a client can use any type of dissatisfaction as a reason to sue you. If they make a claim against your photography business and you don’t have insurance, then the cost of defending your photography business and all you’ve worked for could come out of your own pocket.
Even if they’re impressed with your portfolio and are interested in hiring you, not having insurance can deter your photography business from moving forward with different opportunities to grow. Here are some examples of when having proof of insurance could benefit you:
Renting out a room or space for your practice Convincing other photographers to collaborate on bigger projects Earning clients’ confidence And more! When you purchase insurance through Simply Business, we provide you with a certificate of insurance (COI) so you can provide proof of coverage to anyone who asks about it.