Insurance & Surety Solutions
Marine Insurance
Marine insurance is not a single product. It is a suite of distinct coverages, each designed to address a specific category of risk in the movement of goods and the operation of vessels. Operators who treat it as a checkbox often discover the hard way that their policy didn't cover what they assumed it did.
Commercial Property & Casualty
Not every business that needs sound insurance advice moves cargo or operates vessels. Nord Young's commercial lines practice is built for businesses, maritime and not, that face real, consequential risk and deserve a broker who takes the time to understand it.
Surety & Bonds
A bond is not insurance. It is a guarantee that you will meet an obligation, whether that is clearing cargo, completing a contract, or holding a license. The surety stands behind you, but you stand behind the surety, and the operators who understand that distinction are the ones who never get surprised by it.
See a breakdown of the most common policies that we bundle below.
Marine Insurance
Commercial P&C
Hull & Machinery (H&M)
Hull and Machinery insurance covers physical loss or damage to the vessel itself (the hull, her machinery, equipment, and fittings). Think of it as the equivalent of property insurance for a ship. If a vessel runs aground, collides with another ship, suffers storm damage, or experiences a machinery breakdown, H&M is the policy that responds to the physical damage.
H&M policies are typically written on an agreed value basis, meaning the insured value of the vessel is established at the outset of the policy rather than determined after a loss. This matters significantly in a total loss scenario. Coverage is usually structured on an Institute Time Clauses (Hulls) form, with terms negotiated through the London market or other specialist marine underwriters.
One area operators sometimes overlook within H&M is the distinction between actual total loss, constructive total loss, and particular average, partial damage that the owner bears a share of depending on the deductible and policy terms. Understanding how your H&M policy handles each scenario before a claim arises is essential.
Protection & Indemnity (P&I)
Where H&M covers the ship itself, Protection and Indemnity insurance covers the shipowner's or charterer's third-party liabilities. This is the coverage that responds when someone else suffers a loss as a result of your vessel's operation.
P&I covers a wide range of liabilities: crew injury and illness, cargo loss or damage for which the carrier is legally liable, collision liability (the portion not covered under H&M), wreck removal, pollution, and passenger liability among others. It also covers the costs of defending claims, which in maritime disputes can be substantial.
Most P&I coverage is provided through mutual clubs, the International Group of P&I Clubs being the dominant structure, rather than through traditional commercial insurers. The mutual model means shipowners pool their risk collectively, with calls (assessments) levied when claims exceed premium pools. For operators who are not members of an IG club, fixed-premium P&I alternatives exist through the commercial market, and Nord Young can assist in sourcing appropriate cover through either channel.
It is worth noting that P&I and H&M are complementary but separate policies. A vessel trading without both is carrying uncovered exposure that most charterers, port authorities, and financiers will not accept. As we saw in the context of the Strait of Hormuz crisis, it was the cancellation of P&I war risk extensions, not just hull coverage, that accelerated the commercial shutdown of the strait.
Freight, Demurrage, & Defence (FD&D)
FD&D covers the legal and professional costs of pursuing or defending commercial disputes that fall outside the liability scope of P&I. Charter party disputes, unpaid freight and hire, demurrage and laytime claims, bunker quality and quantity disputes, newbuilding and sale and purchase contract disputes, and cargo recovery actions all fall within it. The distinction from P&I is worth understanding clearly.
P&I covers your liability to a third party and the cost of defending that liability. FD&D covers your legal costs in a commercial dispute where no third party liability is in issue, including where you are the claimant. Cover is usually provided by the same clubs that write P&I, as a separate class with its own limits and its own discretionary element, and it typically includes access to the club's in house lawyers and correspondents.
For operators whose commercial exposure runs through charter parties and bills of lading, FD&D is frequently the coverage that determines whether a legitimate claim is pursued or written off, since the cost of arbitrating a demurrage dispute can exceed the amount in dispute.
Cargo Insurance
Cargo insurance covers the goods being transported rather than the vessel carrying them. It is relevant to cargo owners, shippers, traders, freight forwarders, anyone with a financial interest in the goods themselves.
Cargo policies are typically written on an Institute Cargo Clauses (ICC) form, with three primary tiers of coverage. ICC (A) is the broadest, covering all risks of physical loss or damage subject to named exclusions. This is the form used when you hear the term All-Risk Insurance. ICC (B) and ICC (C) offer progressively narrower coverage, covering only specified perils such as fire, sinking, collision, or overturning. Most sophisticated cargo interests should be on ICC (A) unless there is a specific reason to accept a narrower form.
A common misconception is that the carrier's liability, governed by the Hague-Visby Rules or applicable bill of lading terms, is sufficient protection for cargo owners. It is not. Carrier liability is capped, time-barred, and subject to numerous defenses including nautical fault and act of God. Cargo insurance exists precisely to fill the gap between what a carrier owes and what a cargo owner actually lost. Nord Young places cargo coverage across a broad range of commodities and trade lanes, including breakbulk, bulk, containerized, and project cargo.
USL&H & Maritime Employers Liability
State workers' compensation does not cover every worker at a marine operation, and the gap catches employers repeatedly. The Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act covers maritime employees who are not crew, including longshoremen, stevedores, harbor workers, shipbuilders, and ship repairers working on navigable waters or the adjoining areas used for loading, unloading, building, or repairing vessels.
Separately, crew members qualify as seamen and fall outside both state workers' compensation and USL&H, pursuing claims instead against their employer under the Jones Act, which is addressed through maritime employers liability cover.
An operator running both shoreside and vessel personnel needs all three lines properly coordinated. Misclassifying a worker, or assuming state coverage extends to the dock, produces an uninsured claim at exactly the moment it is most expensive.
Commercial Property
Commercial property insurance covers your physical assets (buildings, equipment, inventory, and furnishings) against perils including fire, theft, vandalism, and certain weather events.
For businesses that own or lease physical space, this coverage protects the infrastructure your operation depends on. Policy terms vary significantly in how they value losses. Replacement cost coverage pays to rebuild or replace at current prices, while actual cash value coverage factors in depreciation.
Equipment Breakdown
Equipment breakdown coverage, historically called boiler and machinery, responds to the sudden and accidental failure of mechanical, electrical, and pressure equipment. Commercial property policies typically exclude internal breakdown, covering damage from external perils but not the failure of the equipment itself.
This coverage addresses the repair or replacement cost, and importantly the business interruption that follows when critical equipment stops working. For operations dependent on refrigeration, compressors, generators, HVAC, or production machinery, the interruption loss is usually larger than the equipment loss.
Business Auto
If your business owns, leases, or regularly uses vehicles in its operations (delivery vehicles, company cars, service trucks) commercial auto insurance covers liability and physical damage arising from their use. Personal auto policies typically exclude business use, meaning operators who rely on personal coverage for commercial activity are often uninsured when it matters.
Employment Practices Liability (EPLI)
Employment practices liability covers claims brought by employees, former employees, and in some cases applicants. Wrongful termination, discrimination, harassment, retaliation, failure to promote, and wage and hour allegations are the typical triggers.
General liability policies exclude these claims and workers' compensation does not reach them, which leaves an uninsured gap that most employers do not identify until a claim arrives. The exposure scales with headcount but does not require it. A single claim from one employee can generate six figures in defense costs regardless of outcome.
Directors & Officers Liability (D&O)
Directors and officers liability protects the personal assets of your company's leadership against claims arising from decisions made in their corporate capacity. Allegations of mismanagement, breach of fiduciary duty, misrepresentation to investors or lenders, regulatory investigations, and shareholder disputes all fall within its scope. Privately held companies frequently assume D&O is only relevant to public corporations. That is incorrect.
Private company D&O claims commonly arise from lenders, competitors, regulators, employees, and minority shareholders, and the defense costs alone are often enough to threaten a closely held business.
For any company with outside investors, a board, a bank covenant, or plans to raise capital or sell, D&O is foundational rather than optional.
Crime & Fidelity
Crime coverage responds to theft of money, securities, and property by employees or third parties. It typically includes employee dishonesty, forgery, funds transfer fraud, and computer fraud. Social engineering fraud, where an employee is deceived into voluntarily transferring funds to a fraudster, is a distinct exposure that often requires a specific endorsement rather than being covered under the base form.
For businesses that move significant funds, hold client money, or operate across multiple jurisdictions with distributed authority over payments, this is a coverage worth structuring deliberately rather than accepting as a standard inclusion.
Environmental & Pollution Liability
Pollution exclusions in general liability policies are broad, and the coverage they remove is substantial. Environmental liability policies fill that gap, responding to cleanup costs, third party bodily injury and property damage, and regulatory defense arising from pollution conditions.
For terminal operators, fuel handlers, warehousing operations, and any business with underground storage tanks or hazardous materials on site, the exposure is direct.
For vessel operators, pollution liability is largely addressed through P&I cover, but shoreside operations, fueling facilities, and owned real estate frequently sit outside that protection.
Loss of Hire
Loss of hire is the vessel equivalent of business interruption. Where hull and machinery pays to repair the physical damage, loss of hire covers the earnings the vessel fails to generate while it is out of service undergoing those repairs. Cover is written on a daily indemnity basis for an agreed amount, subject to a deductible expressed in days rather than dollars, typically fourteen or thirty days, and capped at a maximum number of indemnity days per casualty and per policy year.
The critical structural point is that loss of hire responds only where the underlying damage is recoverable under the hull policy. A vessel off service for scheduled maintenance, a class survey, or a mechanical failure excluded under H&M generates no loss of hire recovery.
For owners operating on time charter, where off hire provisions transfer the earnings loss directly to the owner the moment the vessel becomes unavailable, loss of hire is the coverage that closes an otherwise unfunded gap between a repairable casualty and a repaired balance sheet.
Charterers Liability
Charterers occupy a position that neither hull nor conventional P&I cover fully protects. A charterers liability policy responds to the charterer's exposure for damage to the chartered vessel itself, cargo liability, pollution liability arising from the charterer's orders, and defense costs in disputes with owners.
For any company that charters tonnage rather than owning it, whether on a voyage, time, or bareboat basis, this is the primary liability protection, and it is frequently absent from programs assembled around the assumption that the owner's insurance is sufficient.
War Risk
Standard hull and P&I policies exclude war risk, which means a vessel carrying full H&M and P&I cover has no protection against the losses that dominate current headlines. War risk is written separately, on both sides. War risk hull covers physical loss or damage to the vessel from war, civil war, insurrection, capture, seizure, arrest, detainment, mines, torpedoes, terrorism, and piracy. P&I war risk extensions cover the corresponding third party liabilities, including crew injury and death, pollution, and wreck removal arising from a war peril.
Cover is priced by transit and geography against the Joint War Committee's listed areas, and rates move sharply with conditions. Two structural features catch operators out.
First, war risk policies typically carry short cancellation provisions, often seven days and sometimes less, meaning cover can be withdrawn or repriced with minimal notice.
Second, transits into a listed area usually require prior notification and payment of an additional premium, and failing to notify can void the cover entirely for that voyage.
Any operator trading near a designated high risk area should understand their notification obligations, their cancellation exposure, and the geographic scope of their policy before the vessel is committed rather than after.
Kidnap and Ransom
Kidnap and ransom covers the financial and operational consequences of crew or personnel being taken hostage. It responds to ransom payments, the cost of specialist response consultants who manage negotiations, transit of ransom funds, medical and psychiatric care for those released, loss of income during captivity, and legal liability arising from the incident. The response service is often the more valuable half of the product.
Policies are typically written with access to a specialist crisis response firm engaged from the moment an incident is reported, which matters because the outcome of a hostage situation depends heavily on how the first hours are handled.
Two points are worth understanding. Cover is generally void if its existence is disclosed, since knowledge that a ransom is insured raises the price demanded, so confidentiality is a condition of the policy rather than a preference. And while piracy is addressed to some degree under war risk and P&I, neither responds to ransom payment or negotiation costs in the way a dedicated policy does.
For operators trading in the Gulf of Guinea, the Singapore Strait, the southern Red Sea, or the Arabian Gulf, this is a standalone placement rather than an extension of an existing one.
Terminal Operators, Wharfingers, and Ship Repairers Legal Liability
These are distinct legal liability covers responding to damage to property in your care, custody, or control.
Terminal operators legal liability covers loss or damage to cargo while it is in your possession at a terminal or warehouse. Wharfingers legal liability responds to damage to vessels at your berth or dock arising from the condition of your facility. Ship repairers legal liability covers damage to a vessel while it is in your yard for repair or maintenance.
General liability policies exclude property in your care, custody, or control, which means these operations are uninsured for their most likely and most significant loss unless the specific cover is in place.
General Liability
General liability (GL) is the foundational commercial coverage most businesses carry. It protects against third-party claims of bodily injury and property damage arising from your business operations, premises, or products.
If a client is injured at your office, a contractor damages a customer's property, or your product causes harm, GL is the first line of defense. It also covers the cost of legal defense, which is often significant even when claims are ultimately resolved in your favor.
Business Interruption
Business interruption (BI) coverage, sometimes called business income insurance, is frequently underappreciated until it is needed. It covers lost revenue and ongoing fixed expenses when a covered event forces a business to suspend or reduce operations. A fire that destroys your facility, for example, may be covered under your property policy, but the months of lost income while you rebuild are a separate exposure that BI addresses.
For businesses with thin margins or high fixed costs, a gap in BI coverage can be as damaging as the underlying loss itself.
Inland Marine
Despite the name, inland marine has little to do with vessels. It covers property in transit over land and mobile equipment that a standard commercial property policy will not follow off premises. Contractors' equipment, cargo moving by truck or rail, tools, computers and portable technology, and goods held at locations other than your scheduled premises all fall within it.
For freight forwarders, logistics operators, and any business whose valuable property regularly leaves its own address, inland marine closes a gap that commercial property leaves open by design.
Worker's Compensation
Workers' compensation provides coverage for employees who suffer work-related injuries or illness, covering medical expenses and a portion of lost wages. It is mandatory in most states and structured by state law, which governs benefit levels, classification codes, and experience modification factors that drive your premium.
Proper classification of employees and accurate payroll reporting are among the most consequential factors in managing workers' comp costs over time.
Professional Liability (Errors & Omissions)
For service-based businesses, consultants, brokers, advisors, contractors, professional liability coverage protects against claims that your services or advice caused a client financial harm. Standard general liability policies do not cover professional errors. This coverage fills that gap. In industries where clients rely on your professional judgment, it is not optional.
Fiduciary Liability
Fiduciary liability protects those responsible for administering employee benefit plans against claims of mismanagement. Imprudent investment selection, excessive fees, administrative errors, and improper denial of benefits are the common allegations. ERISA imposes personal liability on plan fiduciaries, meaning the individuals administering the plan can be pursued personally.
Companies frequently assume their D&O policy or the plan's own bonding requirement addresses this. Neither does.
Cyber Liability
Cyber liability covers the financial consequences of a data breach, ransomware attack, business email compromise, or system failure. It typically responds on two sides.
First party coverage addresses your own losses, including forensic investigation, data restoration, business interruption from system downtime, ransom payments where legally permissible, and breach notification costs.
Third party coverage addresses claims brought against you by customers, partners, or regulators whose data was exposed.
For maritime and logistics operators, cyber exposure has grown well beyond office IT. Vessel navigation and cargo management systems, port community systems, and the payment instructions that move through freight and chartering transactions are all active targets. Fraudulent payment diversion, where an attacker impersonates a counterparty and redirects funds, is now among the most common losses in the sector and is frequently excluded from standard crime policies unless specifically endorsed.
Umbrella & Excess Liability
Umbrella and excess liability policies provide an additional layer of protection above the limits of your underlying GL, commercial auto, and employer's liability policies.
For businesses with meaningful assets to protect, or those operating in higher-risk environments, relying solely on primary policy limits is a structural vulnerability. An umbrella policy is typically one of the most cost-effective ways to substantially increase your overall coverage position.