You’ve dedicated your life to helping others lead healthy and happy lives by becoming a personal trainer.
What could go wrong, and yet you’re pursuing a noble career?
You need to realize that your clients may sue you for professional liability. They’ll argue that they were injured due to your negligence. Or you may face general liability from a third party.
Getting insurance for fitness instructors is one of the ways you’ll protect yourself from these liabilities. The insurance company will compensate any individuals who sue you for damages. The only issue is that you don’t know how this insurance policy works and why you need it.
To help you out, here is a guide to insurance for fitness instructors and personal trainers.
What Is Covered by the Personal Liability Insurance for Fitness Instructors?
Many new personal instructors have no idea why they need to get liability insurance. Some see it as an unnecessary cost that only lowers their income. Others view it as a ploy by the insurance companies to boost their sales.
The cause of this confusion is because they don’t understand the specific things the personal liability insurance covers. So, to help you understand, here are some of these things:
Clients Injuries
Despite your best efforts, some of your clients may get injured during the training sessions. These people may sue you for compensation to cater for medical treatment. So to avoid paying for these damages from your pocket, invest in a business insurance policy.
The great thing about this policy is that it also covers damaged business and customers’ properties. With this policy, you’ll focus on your work, thereby delivering excellent personal training services.
Slip and Fall Accidents
After cleaning your gym’s pavement or floor, you may forget to put out a slippery floor sign. The problem is when someone slips and gets injured. This person may sue you seeking compensation for the injuries suffered.
To protect yourself against these risks, you need to get a general liability insurance cover. This policy will compensate third parties who suffer harm due to your actions as a personal trainer.
Employees Medical Expenses
As your gym expands and you start getting more clients, you may decide to hire other personal trainers. Besides, you’ll need workers to clean and maintain the gym. If any of these individuals are injured while working, they are entitled to workers’ compensation.
So, to protect yourself from this risk, you need to invest in a workers’ compensation insurance policy. This coverage will cater for injured employees’ treatment costs and lost wages. Besides, it’ll also pay legal fees if you’re sued by one of your workers for work-related injuries.
Professional Negligence Lawsuits
When some people are injured at the gym, they blame the instructor instead of seeing it as an accident. They claim that the personal trainer gave them the wrong instructions. Or he recommended the wrong exercise routine that led to the injuries.
So these people will be suing you for professional negligence, seeking large compensation amounts. If you’re not careful, such lawsuits may bankrupt your business and cause you to close down your gym. That’s why you need to be prepared by having an insurance policy that covers you against professional negligence lawsuits.
Types of Insurance Policies for Personal Trainers
You need to check different types of insurance policies for fitness instructors to determine the one to get. You want an insurance plan that protects you against the specific dangers you face. Here are the three most popular insurance plans for personal trainers:
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Professional Liability Insurance
This insurance offers coverage against things that directly relate to your work as a personal trainer. So, it covers things like clients’ injuries or clients’ damaged properties. Given the importance of this policy, all fitness instructors should consider having it.
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General Liability Insurance
With this insurance coverage, you get protection against claims arising from third parties. So this policy offers coverage against damages that occur from things outside your work as a personal trainer. For instance, this insurance provides coverage against slip and falls accidents.
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Product Liability Insurance
As a personal trainer, you may sell or endorse various fitness products such as protein shakes. The problem is when your clients suffer harm due to the usage of these products and sue you. They’ll argue that they relied on you as an expert to guide them on the best fitness products to use.
So, these people hold you liable for recommending defective products and expect you to compensate them. To protect yourself against such claims, you need to buy a product liability insurance policy.
Where to Get the Best Liability Insurance for Fitness Instructors?
You’ll find many companies now offering liability insurance for fitness instructors making it hard to choose the best one. To ease your work, compare quotes from different companies and read online reviews. You want to find a company that offers the best liability insurance at a fair cost.
Besides, you want an insurance company that you can trust to offer timely compensation. The idea is to avoid a situation where the claim process takes too long, thereby affecting your work. For instance, it’s hard to effectively run a gym when sued for damages by one of your clients.
Finally, you should look for an insurance company that offers packages that meets your needs. For instance, comprehensive insurance for group fitness instructors, lowering the premiums you pay.
Protect Yourself by Investing in the Best Liability Insurance for Personal Trainers
As a personal trainer, you do your best to mitigate different things that may harm your clients or third parties. However, some things are beyond your control as bad things may still happen despite your efforts. So to protect yourself, you need insurance for fitness instructors.
To simplify your work, find the top company that offers these insurance policies. You want to get coverage that protects you against various dangers like claims from injured clients. Also, get a policy that covers you against claims from third parties.
For more practical fitness and business advice, please see our other blogs.
