EAA Tackles COPA Insurance Plan

I just read that the US-based Experimental Aircraft Association has recently announced their own insurance plan for their Canadian members. Canadian members of EAA have long asked for a plan that will cover them, since the main EAA insurance plan is limited to US-based aircraft and owners.

The new EAA Canadian plan is being run by Nacora Insurance Brokers with Global Aerospace as underwriter. At one time Global had been the underwriter for the COPA insurance program, but COPA's broker, Marsh Insurance, moved the plan to the current Travelers 5000 Syndicate at Lloyd's when Global hiked their rates. Since then I think that Global has been keen to get back into the Canadian market and compete with the COPA plan.

The new EAA insurance plan, which they have dubbed "C-PLAN", offers both:

* "Liability only coverage for pilots with optional non-owned hull coverage"
* "Liability and hull coverage for specified aircraft"

These are all via individual quotes, rather than tables, like the COPA Silver Wings plan.

The EAA plan also includes:

*Medical Expenses ($10,000 CAD)
*Search And Rescue ($25,000 CAD)
*Emergency Expenses ($5,000 CAD)
*Headset and Handheld Avionics ($1,500 CAD)
*Personal Property ($5,000 CAD)
*Hangar and Contents ($50,000 CAD)
*Premises Liability Extension
*Work In Progress (WIP) available upon request

Of note the headset and handheld avionics coverage is something the COPA plan has always excluded.

To administer the new plan EAA has set up a new website www.eaainsurance.ca. While it is attractively laid out, it is short on detailed information and really just funnels pilots into requesting a quote for either type of coverage.

In my opinion more competition in the Canadian private aircraft insurance market can only be a good thing as it should result in decreased rates and improved coverage and service.

I would be interested to read posts from any aircraft owners or pilots who have received a quote from the EAA plan and compared it to the COPA plan and other competitive options. How did the quote stack up? If the rates were low are you concerned that this will be a first-year phenomena and that rates will rise in future years once they have built up some business by taking it away from their competition?