Ho-Ho-Host Liquor Liability

With the holidays comes snow, shopping, wrapping, and,
of course, parties. Parties are synonymous with the holiday season and they bring everyone together, typically around
a variety of festive beverages. If you love to host holiday parties where alcohol is served, you may want to think
about an Umbrella policy that includes coverage for Host Liquor Liability.

HERE’S THE SCENARIO

You host a wonderfully festive party but one of your guests causes a car accident on their way home. You didn’t serve this person, but they were drinking in your house, and because of this you could be held accountable for their mistake.

This isn’t to scare you into not hosting parties; parties are the best, and you should keep having them, just know your risk and be prepared. One way to reduce your risk when hosting a party is to hire a bartender through a service that carries insurance. When you hire a service, they should have some form of insurance in place to cover them against the previously described situation. This removes your risk, as any liability is now on the bartending service as they’re the one serving drinks.

For those of you who host more of an “open house/BYOB” type of event, unfortunately you still have some risk here. Allowing guests to consume alcohol under your roof makes you liable for damages/personal injury in the eyes of the law.

This all sounds very scrooge-like but it doesn’t have to be. An Umbrella policy is a very inexpensive way to cover all this (and much more) at an extremely low cost. For a $1million Umbrella, the cost is typically less than $200 per year and gives you an extra layer of protection for many different scenarios.