Monday, October 13, 2008

October wedding? Then think about wedding insurance

Photo by Flickr's TooterMonkey

I'm sitting at home on my usual day off, just watching the orange-reddish glow of the sun illuminate my fingers at the keyboard, wondering why I've been to so many weddings in Southern California in October. "So many" may be an exaggeration, but maybe not, since I've not been to a lot of weddings as a guest, but I've been three as a guest in October. That's a lot in my book. And since determining earlier this year that October is quite the popular month for weddings (at least among people who read this blog), it seems that wedding insurance must also be a popular must-have for October weddings in Southern California. Or at least it seems it should be.

The above photo, by the way, is of Malibu Presbyterian Church, which was destroyed in last year's fire in Malibu, which was part of the 2007 California Firestorm.



Having worked in news the past five years and lived in Southern California all my life, October and November are reliably the worst wildfire months of the year. I have actually decorated and been a guest at one wedding where a fire broke out in the canyon behind the reception site, the Castaway in Burbank. But it seems to me that maybe wedding insurance isn't for everyone...

Apparently, cold feet is one of the main reasons for a wedding being canceled, and insurance doesn't cover cold feet. Sorry. However, let's be optimistic and posit that both bride and groom and in-laws-to-be are ecstatic to be joining families and talk about all the other things a bride or groom or wedding planner cannot control and might need insurance on.
  • The church or the reception site: Say you've picked the most gorgeous sites available, nestled in the mountains of Malibu or along the beach in Texas -- but then there's a wildfire or a hurricane. This is where insurance would come in handy.
  • A vendor is a no-show, something happens to the food or the flowers, someone's car/truck breaks down or something else vendor-related: This happens more than you might think, and I'm sorry to say I've had this happen to me too. If you had to cancel or postpone for something like this, insurance would cover it.
  • A member of the wedding party gets sick or is injured in an accident: God forbid your mother or father or an in-law becomes injured or gets sick, but this is definitely something covered by insurance.


I think those would be the main reasons, although, TheKnot.com also includes military deployments or surprise corporate moves as another reason why a wedding would be postponed or canceled. Although, I think in the case of a corporate move, the wedding might just become more of a destination wedding.

Anyway, do you think to might need insurance? In tough economic times, most would say -- better safe than sorry. Personally, I think the ratio of cash flow to wedding expenditure should have more to do with the need for wedding insurance, and as that ratio becomes bigger, the more you should consider going easy on your wedding budget.

Then again, what about people really looking forward to getting married that day? I did a blog post last year on one couple that immediately readjusted their plans as Malibu burned. The whole point to the wedding, after all, is to get married.

At any rate, beside TheKnot.com article I found, here are a few more resources on wedding insurance from USA Today, InsWeb's Insurance Blog, and MoneyTalksNews.com.

And as with anything wedding related, I would recommend going with a wedding insurance policy on a recommendation, rather than what comes up first in Google. Hey, that's how I looked for it too!

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