You work hard as a personal trainer to help your clients achieve their fitness goals. You need a personal trainer liability insurance policy that works as hard as you do every day. Just like you are there for your clients, Insure Fitness Group is here for you with affordable and comprehensive coverage.
Liability insurance for personal trainers can be confusing and tricky at times. That is why we have created this guide to everything you need to know about personal trainer insurance. Take a deep breath in as we jump into this training session on what you need to know about liability insurance for personal trainers.
What does Personal Trainer Liability Insurance Do?
To begin, it is important to know what personal trainer insurance is and how it will benefit you. Liability insurance for personal trainers helps protect your personal financial resources in the event of a lawsuit or liability claim against you, as well as additional situations. As a personal trainer, there is some inherent risk of injury or incident during a training session. If a client sustains an injury while under your training or in your facility, you could be held liable for the cost of their medical bills, lawyer fees, and other related expenses.
Personal fitness trainer insurance would help cover the cost of a liability claim against you so that you do not have to pay it from your personal finances. Essentially, insurance for fitness coaches is putting a safety net in place should something unforeseen happen. It is an investment in your financial security and ensures that you and your career are protected from a liability lawsuit or other form of covered loss.
Types of Liabilities Covered by Personal Trainer Insurance
With comprehensive coverage from IFG, you are protected from several different liabilities, including general, professional, and product liability claims. This means that you have a full-body protection plan that spots you just in case.
Professional Liability Coverage
Professional liabilities are those that are directly related to your fitness coaching. Some common claims would include injury from over-exertion, pulled muscles, torn tendons, and other such injuries. Because you are pushing your clients to train to the best of their ability and often work intensely, there is a potential for professional liability claims during your career.
Let’s look at a potential example of a professional liability event for personal trainers:
A client is working with you in a CardioCore® workout when they begin to feel a tightness in their chest. The tightness turns to pain, and your client collapses to the floor. Your client is having a heart attack and needs to be rushed to the emergency room right away. At the hospital, your client’s condition is severe, and they perform emergency surgery. Fortunately, the surgery is successful, and they begin the road to recovery.
Once your client recovers, they hire a lawyer and file a professional liability claim against you for their medical bills and the loss of income due to missing work. In this case, professional liability insurance for personal trainers may help cover the cost of this lawsuit and protect you financially. IFG would help cover up to $1 million per occurrence with an annual aggregate of $3 million.
General Liability Coverage
While professional liability coverage protects you against claims related to your personal training, general liability coverage protects you against claims that are not resulting from your work. General liability coverage is often called “slip and fall” insurance since these are the most common types of claims.
Let’s consider another potential scenario for general liability:
A client is leaving after a training session and stops to get some water from the filling station. As they walk over, they slip on a puddle of water that has been neglected to be cleaned up from an earlier spill. As they fall, they land on a weight rack and chip a tooth on the metal bars. They go to a dentist to have their tooth repaired and then file a liability claim against you for medical expenses.
The cost of this claim can add up quickly and leave you in financial distress. In cases like the above, IFG helps cover the cost of the lawsuit by paying up to $1 million per occurrence with an annual maximum of $3 million.
Product Liability Coverage
Though fitness coaching does not always involve the use of products, product liability coverage is still a vital part of personal trainer insurance. Common product liability claims include adverse or allergic reactions to a chemical or an injury related to equipment malfunction. As there is an inherent risk with personal training, adding the use of weight machines and other exercise equipment only increases the possibility of an accident.
Here is an illustration of a potential product liability claim for CPTs:
You are working with a client on a stair-climber when the machine malfunctions and locks up quickly. The sudden stop makes your client all forward where they hit their head on the front of the stair-climber. The impact hits your client hard enough to knock them unconscious, and you call an ambulance to take them to the hospital. Once they regain consciousness and are treated for their injuries, your client contacts their lawyer to file a claim against you.
This situation would prove where product liability is a vital component of a personal trainer’s insurance. With the comprehensive coverage from IFG, you can rest easy knowing that your finances are safe and secure should an incident like the ones above occur.
Additional Coverage and Terms to Know
IFG offers full coverage that helps with more than just the above liability claims. Along with incredible benefits, personal trainer liability insurance from IFG covers:
- Hundreds of modalities and exercises: One of the reasons personal trainer insurance from IFG is a step above the rest is that they cover nearly every exercise and fitness modality imaginable. With protection for everything from Tae Bo to Circuit Training, we offer an impressive range of coverage for all types of activities.
- Stolen/damaged equipment: IF your equipment is stolen or damaged, we will pay up to $1,000 to repair or replace the lost equipment. You only have to pay a $250 deductible when something is stolen or damaged.
- Rental property damage protection: A good number of personal trainers need to rent a space to hold their classes or perform training sessions. If an accident causes damage to your rental property, your landlord could hold you responsible for the cost of the repairs. That is why we include up to $100,000 coverage for rental property damages.
- Identity Theft Protection: With the online world ever growing, it can provide an excellent opportunity to advertise and grow your client base. However, it also puts you at a higher risk for identity theft and malicious attacks. IFG will cover up to $25,000 of monetary loss if your identity is stolen.
- Portable coverage: Sometimes, the road of life is unpredictable. If you need to move or train in a different facility, your coverage follows you wherever life takes you.
- Online teaching is covered: With the 2020 pandemic, many personal trainers have moved to perform their classes and training sessions online. IFG covers online courses just as if they were taking place in person.
Outstanding Member Benefits
Another essential thing to know about IFG's personal trainer insurance is that it has some incredible benefits. In addition to the comprehensive coverage, the member benefits are designed to be added perks exclusively for our policyholders. Some of the best benefits include:
- Professional website: As a member, you get a professionally designed website to promote your fitness classes, blog about personal training, or secure clients.
- Access to affordable health insurance plans: One of the most incredible benefits is having access to a wide range of health care insurance plans to help keep your health in tip-top shape. You take good care of your clients, and you deserve to be well taken care of yourself.
- Loads of freebies and discounts: As an IFG member, you get tons of free benefits like magazine subscriptions and deep discounts on the brands and products you use daily.
Cost of Personal Trainer Liability Insurance
The next thing you need to know about personal trainer insurance is how much it’ll cost and to compare your options. We offer professional and student rates to accommodate every career stage. If you work full-time as a personal trainer, the professional rate of $179 for one year of coverage is the plan for you. You can pay all at once or in monthly installments.
If you are still learning how to help others achieve their fitness goals, then the student rate of $59 for the first year of coverage is perfect for you. You will still receive the same incredible coverage and benefits at a deep discount.
