BOW WAVE 491

Bow Wave Issue 491--Singapore Easter Edition

news and views on trade, insurance and risk

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(c)2009 WavyLine.com	Issue No 491 13 Apr 09
Published free of charge to Readers
Editor: Sam Ignarski
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In this issue:

1. Welcome
2. Kidnap insurance costs up tenfold in Gulf of Aden
3. SOP Goes Regional
4. Business as Usual in Singapore
5. Adequacy of Coverage
6. And Finally...

1. Welcome

Poem of the Week

My gardner sits
And earns his pay
Dreaming the happy
Hours away

Till evening comes
When like a shot
He hurries to
His private plot

Where he will work
Like one possessed
And never stop
To take a rest

How very splendid
It would be
If he would work
Like that for me!

Reginald Arkell from the gardening anthology of his poems called Collected Green Fingers
(thanks to John Eagle for sending this one in)

New Readers this week include:-

J Van der Schans of ABS
Hantasoa Rasoa of Nestle in Vevey
David Bowman of Stony Brook University
Nick Hart of the BMS Group

Note from the Editor

Greetings from a cloudy, rather cold Easter here in England. We were gratified at the protest which greeted the poemless edition last week. This week's edition is rather full of Singapore related stories.

Enjoy!

2. Kidnap Insurance Costs up Tenfold in Gulf of Aden

Alexandra Lewis writes:-

Shipowners navigating the Gulf of Aden are seeing insurance premiums for kidnap and random (K&R) increase tenfold as piracy escalates, according to global insurance broker Aon Risk Services. This means shipowners could be paying USD30,000 premium for USD3 million of cover for one journey through this piracy hotspot. However, more are opting for cover to protect their employees as well as avoiding lengthy detours that threaten supply chains and increase petrol costs.

Specialist piracy policies for kidnap and ransom insurance can include cover for consultant and negotiator costs, ransom demands and medical care. These can be bought for individual transits or on an annual basis to bring down the cost.

Ashley Leszczuk from Aon’s crisis management team commented: "The cost of insurance is simply rising in correlation with the risk of kidnap in piracy hotspots. Despite the presence of naval ships, the spate of piracy attacks over the last six months does not seem to be abating with increased civil unrest and pirates’ easy access to rocket launchers and AK47s. As such we’ve seen enquiries for cover escalate as shipowners seek to protect their employees and businesses."

Some 70% of shipowners are opting for localised policies for the Gulf of Aden, the Gulf of Guinea stretching down to Somalia and the Straits of Malacca while a third of policies placed by Aon cover all locations worldwide.

(It is said that the piracy danger will be dealt with properly by governments only when its nuisance value increases and it advances to the status of being financially burdensome to the world economy--that time is perhaps arriving--ed)

3. SOP Goes Regional

Ken Norman has sent in word of the move by the The Shipowners’ P&I Club, the secialist insurer for smaller vessel owners worldwide to open a branch in Singapore.

The idea is to serve the Club’s many Members and their brokers in the Asian region. Initially serving the membership in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia it is intended that the branch will eventually extend its sphere of operation into other countries in Asia as well.

Over 20 years since it first began underwriting there, South East Asia is now one of the Club’s largest operating areas with over 500 Members and nearly 5000 entered vessels representing around 25% of the total tonnage entered in the Club. It is a natural development for the Club to start a full underwriting and claims handling office to serve the regional membership. With offices already in London and Vancouver the opening of the Asian office represents the final step in the implementation of the Club’s strategy to provide a truly global service for the membership, segmented into three 8 hour time zones.

Led by Steve Randall as General Manager and David Heaselden as Principal Officer, the branch will be open for business from 27th April as Shipowners’ Asia Pte Ltd with a full team of underwriters and claims handlers ready to serve the membership in conjunction with the Club’s correspondents Spica Services whose network of Asian offices will provide claims handling support.

The Club will be marking the opening of the branch with a reception at the end of Maritime Week in Singapore on Friday 24th April

(It is surely right for the Club to offer both underwriting and claims services in regional mode. It is to be hoped that the Club, which has always been a small, frugal organisation will manage the tensions at home. One of the least well kept secrets of the P&I industry is that it is perfectly feasible to offer all the services needed regionally with staff recruited locally. But in any process of decentralisation, the last bastion of scepticsm is always found in the centre-ed)

4. Business as Usual in Singapore

This story appears in David Hughes' e-zine of 06APR09

Singapore refutes lay-up claims

THE Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore has denied claims ships are being allowed to lay up in its anchorages following publication of a P&I club circular warning of the danger of collisions with laid-up vessels.

The American P&I Club says its alert affects vessels sailing through, or anchoring in, the territorial waters of Singapore, including the eastern and western outer port limit (OPL) anchorages, where there is a danger of collisions.

The club says: "Our very recent experience of certain, thankfully only small, collision claims, together with more general comments from other sources, point to an increased risk of collisions in this area where there has been a significant rise in the number of vessels lying at anchor.

"It would appear that the most recent spate of collisions has occurred at the eastern OPL anchorage, where a number of ships manoeuvring within the area have collided with vessels already at anchor."

MPA port master Lee Cheng Wee is quoted by Lloyd's list as saying the anchorages have not become more crowded due to the economic downturn and that concerns over increasing congestion are unfounded.

Acknowledging the assistance of London Offshore Consultants in compiling the general observations, the club adds: "The congestion at Singapore has become a matter of considerable anecdotal comment " not least for those flying into Changi Airport on certain approaches who are best able to see the multitude of vessels anchored in the areas in question."

http://www.mgn.com

5. Adequacy of Coverage

Max Fulton, who has a stong background in insurance auditing writes:-

Our company was recently approached by a firm of lawyers who had a client that is a licensed customs broker/freight forwarder with a large operation. The client was concerned that its current insurances were not in all cases adequate and appropriate to its operational risk profile and in other cases that it might have double insurance. Accordingly, the client, through the lawyers, our company to perform a review of its insurances, with the outcome of the review being recommendations regarding the adequacy of the level and mix of the company’s insurance coverage.

A common function in company’s Audit and Risk Management Committees’ charters is to "Review adequacy of insurance coverage". In order to fulfill this function more and more Audit and Risk Management Committees are turning to external experts to provide a report on the adequacy of the company’s insurance coverage (including the Board’s own Directors and Officers cover). Companies are reluctant to go to their insurance broker for such an assessment as there is a perceived conflict of interest, nor can they turn to another insurance broker because of confidentiality issues and there is also the fear that another broker could be critical of the insurance coverage as a way of inveigling its way into a new client. So, in many cases, companies that do not have the expertise in-house and who take their obligations seriously, turn in the first instance to their lawyer or accountant. However, such a service is well outside the expertise of most lawyers and accountants (and probably outside their professional indemnity/errors and omissions protection as well). Accordingly, as in this case, the lawyer or accountant will therefore turn to an independent specialist company like ours. In addition to insurance coverage adequacy assessments, GCA provides underwriting/coverholder audits, reinsurance inspection services, regulatory/compliance training, claim reviews, claim run-off services, claims management, financial services compliance audits and other related services.

contact Max at:-

max.fulton@gca-compliance.com

6. And Finally...

These jokes come to us courtesy of the House of Frazer Hunt Although some are very vulgar, we removed several more in the interests of quiet good taste (ed)

I just saw that Harry Potter film. A bit unrealistic if you ask me. I mean, a ginger kid, with two friends?

I had a mate who was suicidal. He was really depressed, so I pushed him in front of a steam train.
He was chuffed to bits.

When I got divorced, my wife said she would fight for custody of the kids. Took her out with one punch.
My granddad gave me some sound advice on his deathbed. "It's worth spending money on good speakers," he told me.
A woman brings eight-year-old Johnny home and tells his mother that he was caught playing doctors and nurses with Mary, her eight-year-old daughter. Johnny's mother says, "Let's not be too harsh on them.... they are bound to be curious about 5ex at that age." "Curious about 5ex?" replies Mary's mother. "He's taken her appendix out!"

I was walking in a cemetery this morning and seen a bloke hiding behind a gravestone. I said "morning."
He replied, "No, just having a sh1t."

Disabled toilets. Ironically, the only toilets big enough to run around in.

I was reading in the paper today about this dwarf that got pick pocketed.
How could anyone stoop so low?

P.S.

Black

The most powerful politician in the world is black.

The head of the Republican National Committee is black.

The best known media mogul on earth is black.

The greatest golfer in the world is black.

The top female tennis players in the world are black.

The highest grossing actor worldwide is black.

The fastest racing driver in the world is black.

The brightest Astrophysicist under the sun is black.

The Superbowl-winning Head Coach is black.

The most successful brain surgeon in the world is black.

The fastest human on the planet is black.

... Michael Jackson must be kicking himself.

http://www.jumbojoke.com

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