The spate of school aged child abduction and kidnapping for ransom has become a public social issue that has captured attention in many parts of the world.
Missing Children South Africa (MSCA) states that a child goes missing every five hours in South Africa. Criminals are preying on ordinary citizens, including teenagers and children. The kidnapping rate includes cases of children abducted by family members or an acquaintance and others taken by non-relatives with primarily sexual motives. Other reported abductions represent cases in which strangers abduct and kill children, hold them for ransom, or take them with the intention to keep and other cases remain a mystery.
Schools are seen as targets for child abductions – children are most at risk going to and returning from school.
In general, a school is required to protect the safety and well-being of its students, it is thus likely that a civil lawsuits can be brought against a school and its employees if a child gets abducted and it’s found that safety and precaution measures were not implemented.
Having a Kidnap and Ransom (K&R) policy in place provides coverage should the worst occur, which includes the disappearing and abduction of students from school events or trips.
The Cover assures a policyholder (the school) protection against financial loss, as well as direct access to the Unity Advisory Group and On Call International, as both your consultants and service providers.
With a total of 13 full time consultants including a responder based in South Africa, they have worked on 356 cases for Africa alone, 32 reported cases in South Africa.
A premium of 10% is allocated to pre and post incident training or advice offered by Unity, allowing the schools access to on-line security information portal which they receive as a complimentary subscription.
Schools can also get access to consultants who can provide training and offer guidance in response to a threatening situation.
iTOO’s K&R insurance cover aims to reduce intricate situations by providing protection from the financial consequences of a kidnapping and abduction attempt by offering the following:
- We can embed K&R Consultant Costs to their existing liability policy, giving them access to our Consultants, Unity advisory Group in case of an incident
- We can offer full K&R coverage with the following events being covered:
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- Ransom
- Express Kidnapping
- Accidental Death & Disablement
- Threat Response Expenses
- Hostage Crisis
- Disappearance Investigation Expenses, and
- Child Abduction.
In other headlines, the media has also been full of reports relating to the safety and security of children at school, or during school activities. With the growing number of lawsuits arising out of some school’s failure to keep students safe while on school property or excursions, parents are also becoming a bit more wary of sending their children on school trips.
Apart from school camps, slips and falls on the premises and infrastructural issues, serious injuries also occur regularly on school sports fields.
Schools have the responsibility to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of their students. “The school officials become like parents when a child is in their care,” says Product Champion: Liability and Special Risks, Melita Thurling. “The Constitution, and Schools Act, puts an obligation on teachers and schools to ensure the safety of their learners. If they fail in this obligation, they can be held legally liable.”
Often teachers are faced with an enormous responsibility and the duty to supervise a powder keg of boisterous young people in facilities that may be ill maintained and overcrowded, and are either overwhelmed despite their efforts or fail to realise the extent of their obligation should something go wrong.
The other complication is that, as with all minors, school children have the ability to file a lawsuit against their school once they have reached the age of 18 for wrongs that occurred while they were younger. Thus, an unexpected claim can arise against the school and teachers years later.
As a result, schools require a liability policy for peace of mind to enable them to get on with the business of running schools, knowing that insurance is in place for unexpected events.
Our Cover
iTOO’s policy provides cover for:
- bodily injury suffered by a learner (as a result of a negligent act, error or omission in the provision of the facilities, tuition and training, academic, cultural, spiritual and sport activities),
- ‘school readiness’ academic testing and advisory services and tuition for learners with special needs,
- wrongful expulsion of a learner, and defamation, as well as cover when visiting other schools.
Third parties are taken care of under the public liability section.
The policy does not cover:
- molestation, assault or abuse of any kind experienced by a learner,
- wrongful or excessive discipline of any kind exercised against a learner,
- bullying or harassment of any kind,
- tertiary, adult education or psychological, psychiatric or other medical services.
“Whilst we do provide liability cover to schools, we are concerned about the nature and extent of the claims and take a selective approach as to what risks get covered,” comments Melita.
