October 9, 2008
Protect your stuff with the Equipment Insurance Program
If something in your office or lab is damaged or stolen, the University has insurance to replace it, right? Well, not necessarily. Most equipment in University offices and labs — things like computers and microscopes — are not covered by insurance. Unless, of course, you participate in the UW’s own Equipment Insurance Program.
The Equipment Insurance Program, which is overseen by the Risk Management Office, is self sustaining. The University collects the fees and pays out the claims. Since the University is not seeking to make a profit, the fees are lower, often much lower, than an insurance company would charge. Insurance on a laptop, for example, is 80 cents per $100 of value per year. Thus, if you own a $2,000 laptop, the cost to insure it for a year would be $16.
“It’s really kind of a cool program because it lets the University community insure their equipment at a pretty low cost,” said Angie Kritenbrink, a risk financing analyst in Risk Management. “Especially I’ve noticed for equipment in transit — people will compare our price to that of, say, FedEx and there’s a huge difference.”
The Equipment Insurance Program has been around in its present form since 1996, but it still seems to be relatively unknown, Kritenbrink said. Many people confuse it with the Equipment Inventory Program, which is part of Financial Management. Under that program, everything over a certain value is placed in a database and given a tag as a way of keeping track of the University’s assets. But being tagged and in the database does not mean that the item is insured.
“Often I’ll get a call and the person will say, ‘My laptop got stolen. Is it insured?'” Kritenbrink said. “And I’ll say, ‘Did you insure it?’ because it isn’t automatic.”
Happily, the enrollment process is pretty simple and can be done online. Information can be found at http://www.washington.edu/admin/rmequip/. The new policy year begins in November, but items can be enrolled at any time and fees are prorated. It’s even possible to insure items temporarily — artwork in an exhibit, for example, can be insured for the months that the exhibit runs.
Kritenbrink said that more than 27,000 items have been insured through the Equipment Insurance Program. Of these, laptops are the highest risk items. Because they move around, she explained, they are particularly vulnerable to theft.
Reporting a loss is now easier. A recent new feature is a claim form on the Equipment Insurance Web site than can be either printed out and sent to Risk Management or sent as an e-mail attachment along with any additional required documentation. In the case of a theft, for example, a copy of the police report and a vendor replacement quote is needed. In the case of damage, a vendor repair quote is needed. Once complete documentation is received, the turnaround time for payment of a claim is about four weeks.
There are some limits to what can be covered under the Equipment Insurance Program, but Risk Management staff can often find insurance for items that won’t fit within it.
And Kritenbrink wants more people to know about the program. “It’s a valuable program that can help with stewardship of University resources,” she said.
