How An Added Homeowner’s Coverage Can Protect You For What You Say!

If you explore all the options with social media and participate in conversations with any regularity you know that sometimes what you meant to say on Facebook, a Tweet or in an E-Mail is taken by someone else differently. Sometimes this leads to hard feelings which can be corrected with an apology. Sometimes it leads to a lawsuit that results in the expense of hiring and attorney to defend you. The reason that I am pointing out social media is the thought process and implementation is so much faster than placing a printed letter. It is much easier to communicate what you are thinking online and hit send than it is to type a letter in a word processor, review and mail. Mistakes happen and comments are made that can lead to offense and after you hit send it is impossible to take it back.

It is hard to believe that there is a coverage that adds on to your homeowner’s policy that can extend liability coverage for things that you say and print that lead to libel, slander, defamation of character and invasion of privacy. The coverage is either called “Personal Injury” or in its more proper term “Personal Offense”. The coverage is not automatic, you have to have it added on and it ties into the personal liability on your policy. It is also not a silver bullet to protect you from all things that you say or print but for the price of $5 to $15 per year it is an excellent value.

Here is how it works: If you have $100,000 for personal liability on your homeowner’s policy you would then get up to $100,000 for personal offense. Hopefully, you are carrying at least $500,000 in personal liability (which I highly recommend to all my clients) – you would then have up to $500,000 for personal offense. Contact your insurance agent or insurance company for more details on this important but relatively unknown coverage and have it added to your policy.