July 2018 Agency Newsletter
Our Mission Is Simple
Stone Creek Insurance Agency Is Committed To Knowing, Meeting, And Exceeding Our Clients’ Needs And Expectations.
At A Glance
We Stand WIth Our Affected Clients
Boating Safety
Boating and the spring/summer months go hand and hand. In California, many people go to areas such as Lake Tahoe to take their boat out on the water on a beautiful day. Whether you are a passenger, the boat captain or just happen to be in the water nearby, it’s important that you know how to be safe on and around boats. Below are some tips to stay safe while on the water.
- Do not exceed the number of passengers safely allowed on your vessel. And do not get onto a boat that has exceeded the number of passengers safely allowed.
- Everyone on the boat, especially children should wear a PFD. In many states it is a legal requirement that all children have PFD’s on always while on boats. If an Adult doesn’t want to wear a PFD, they should be readily available always.
- Shut off the engine while passengers are loading and unloading. This is especially important when passengers are unloading and loading for recreational activities such as tubing, waterskiing, wakeboarding and swimming.
- Monitor gauges at the helm to help promote safe operation and identify any issues as soon as possible.
- Be aware of your surroundings, such as water conditions and other vessels. Staying aware will help you react better and in a timely manner should a potential danger occur.
- The primary operator (and back up) should abstain from consuming any alcoholic beverages during or prior to taking the vessel out.
Need a boat insurance quote? Call us today! (925) 297-4202. We wish you a happy and safe boating season! Don’t forget your sunscreen.
Source: https://www.travelers.com/resources/boating/boating-safety-tips
Cyber Liability: I’m not a huge corporation, do I really need it?
In the past five years, there have been more and more examples in the news regarding cyber-attacks. Large retailers have been hit especially hard. This commonly leads small business owners to wonder if they really should even worry about cyber-attacks. They are only happening to large businesses anyway, right? In all reality, cyber-attacks and hacking incidents do not only happen to large businesses. While that is the common misconception, it is not true. We want to share a few examples from one of our insurance company partners, that happened to actual businesses. Today we will share two examples.
A small company has an online sales platform. They receive an alert from a “white hat hacker”, who tells them that there is a back door in its system. He then blackmails the company and demands two bitcoins for his “service”. Due to this, the company had to have the platform investigated by professionals who found that it was significantly compromised. All the data had to be migrated to a new platform. To name a few coverages that intend to cover scenarios such as these and their associations costs are; incident response expenses, cyber extortion loss and network restoration expenses. Without coverage, all costs to have the system investigated and completely migrated to a new platform would be completely out of pocket.
Our second example comes form a law firm. A thief sent an email to the HR payroll manager, pretending to be the managing partner of the firm. The email requested W2 forms of all 150 employees, which the HR payroll manager replied with. Unfortunately, it was only after the email was sent that she realized the email was spoofed. The law firm had to notify every employee of the incident and provide credit and identity monitoring services to every employee. Coverage such as incident response expenses would assist in covering the cost of providing credit and identity monitoring services to every employee, in the wake of this incident. Without coverage, all costs would be out of pocket.
While the most common examples we see in the media are large companies being affected by incidents like these, small companies can be targets as well. Having the correct insurance in place before something happens will help cover the associated expenses of incidents, such as these. Call your agent today for a quote or additional information; (925) 297-4202
Source: https://www.travelers.com/resources/boating/boating-safety-tips