(MCT )MIAMI — For pizza fans, Super Bowl Sunday rates up there with Halloween and the day before Thanksgiving as one really big day. For the pizzerias that deliver, it’s also a big reason for insurance coverage.
Some 1.3 million pies — about 9 million slices — will likely be delivered nationwide by Domino’s on Super Bowl Sunday. Papa John’s, one of the Super Bowl’s official sponsors, expects to sell 600,000 pizzas.
If any of the thousands of pizza delivery drivers on the road Sunday has an accident, the shop owner is liable, especially if the driver doesn’t have sufficient accident coverage.
“The buck stops with the owners,” says Georgianna Stump at Risk Services Corp., one of a handful of U.S. insurance agents who specializes in writing coverage for pizza restaurants. “After all, these may be your only unsupervised employees.”
The cost of the insurance for pizza restaurant owners depends on how much delivery business they do. “The more drivers you have on the road, the more you pay” for coverage, Stump says.
Out of safety concerns — and fear of lawsuits — pizza shops no longer make promises on delivery time. Big chains like Domino’s and Papa John’s stress quality. In the mid-1980s, Domino’s 30-minute delivery guarantee raised allegations that the company’s promise encouraged drivers to drive recklessly to make the deadline.
The need for insurance applies to both local mom-and-pop pizzerias as well as the national chains. Yet while pizza is ubiquitous, insurance coverage for pizza restaurant owners isn’t.
Most insurers are reluctant to take on pizza delivery coverage because accidents, though infrequent, can be severe. That’s means potentially big claims.
Fireman’s Fund, based in Novato, Calif., is one of the few national companies that actively pursues this business, with 15 to 20 percent of the market, estimates company spokesman Brian Gerritsen. A handful of regional companies offer the coverage as well.
Pizza shop insurance “is unique. Every delivery is different,” says Gerritsen, whose company offers a pizza delivery driver safety course.
In Florida, drivers are only required to buy a minimum of $10,000 in personal injury protection, which pays their medical bills and some lost wages if they’re injured in an accident, and property damage coverage to pay repairs for damage they cause to another car or structure in an accident.
Stump advises restaurant owners to require their drivers to add bodily damage liability coverage to their personal auto insurance policies.
She urges delivery drivers to check — and owners to verify — if their personal auto insurance policies exclude coverage for accidents if their cars for business deliveries — a common exclusion in the auto insurance industry.
The restaurants should also carry at least $1 million in extra liability to cover accidents in vehicles they don’t own, she says. Adding another $1 million would be even better.
“In the insurance world, we always worry about the worst case scenario and make sure we’re protected,” Stump says.
