Do most people pay for the marine insurance on their trophy shipments from Africa? I've done it before, but am wondering how often shipments are damaged or lost during shipment and if people have successfully made a claim on this type of insurance. To the taxidermists, do you recommend to your clients to take out the insurance? It's not a significant cost compared to the rest of the trip/shipping/taxidermy, but I don't want to pay it if I don't need it. Thanks for your input.

Successfully making claims against freight companies is like giving you odds on surviving a brain transplant. US freight companies have lobbied and had federal tort tilted to benefit them in such cases. You stand slim to no chance. When they offer you the insurance they are only sucker fishing.

I have to agree with STU on this one. If you are going to purchase freight "insurance", you need to figure in the cost of an attorney to go throught the policy with a fine toothed comb and decipher all of the fine print so that you can make an informed decision as to whether the "policy" is worth the paper it is written on. After this, if you still are interested, you need to figure in the cost of a good plaintiffs attorney that will drag the freight and insurance company into court to attempt to collect on the claim. Then you need to estimate the cost of an attorney that specializes in appeals, so you can continue wasting your money after the judge ruled in the other sides favor because the policy you bought insures nothing but the fact that the issuer will never have to pay a claim. You could also rent an office in DC, and hire a full time staff of Lobbyist to "grease" the wheels of justice with a couple hundred million dollars of your money, so maybe next time the "policy" you buy will truly insure against loss. What where we talking about again?

We recieve dozens of trophy shipments from Africa every year and have never had one come damaged yet. Now I guess it might have more of a chance of getting damaged if they are mounted trophies and not skins and horns, but I would think collecting on any claim would be futile.You would probably spend a lot less on local repair than you would the premium.
Our broker...who shall remain nameless ... and also a good friend of mine, says confidentialy insurance from shiping companies is a scam and waste of money.
Good luck with your trophies and hope they get here in perfect order...Max

Two years ago, I had our "Importer" call me and ask if we wanted insurance (shipped ocean cargo). I thought this was odd since our shipment was due into port within a week (Importer's statement). Well, myself and clients had Leopard and a great number of trophy skins/horns onboard so we each paid over $400 for "insurance." I found out later that our trophies had arrived in port the day before he called. HELL NO! That's the last time anyone will peddle their BS insurance on me. If you lose your trophies, file a claim against all concerns. You'll have about as much luck winning either.
LDK

The responses pretty much validate my feelings. I think I'll email the shipping company now and have him remove that from my quote. Thanks!

I had one incident about 3 years ago in SA where a clients trophies were beig delivered to the airport and the truck was hijacked. He immediatley made it known to the preperator that he would hold him and his insurance comapny responsible as they were still in his care and not to attempt to peddle it off on the shipping insurance. Ultimately they did recover his and the other clients crates where they had been kicked off the truck into a ditch.

The only other loss was in the US where UPS lost 2 horns out of a shipment and never recovered them. They paid to the max of the insurance purchased from UPS after a bit of a hassle over paperwork and appraisals. ($6800)

Unless the aircraft or ship went down or the shipment disappears I doubt you could collect for damages due to blame game over improper packing etc.

Also most preperators recommend super high values which increases the cost. Geting the full value of the hunt or even the trophy fee, prep etc. @ $10s of thousands vs the value of a replacement cape or horns that are already stateside and generally available for $100's seems to be what you are betting you might work out with some foriegn agent should something happen.

So I generally recommend to my cleints that at the very least they reduce the ammount to a realistic value but don't buy it myself!

Best regards
Mike Ohlmann
Mike's Custom Taxidermy Inc.
4102 Cane Run Rd.
Louisville KY 40216
502-448-1309
Mike@mikescustomtaxidermy.com

Are you telling me I would be better off to take the $$$ and buy a couple of Lottery Tickets a week for the rest of my life instead?

I'm okay with that...

Rich