The hospitality industry encompasses a large number of businesses, including restaurants, hotels, bars and catering businesses. All these businesses rely on their food to bring in the sales in their establishment. When disaster strikes and your food is put at risk for contamination or spoilage, your income and the success of your business is put at risk. Your standard hospitality insurance policy might not include food spoilage coverage unless you specifically request it. Understanding the benefits of food spoilage insurance is important to help you determine if you need it on your insurance policy.
Lost Power
If your establishment loses power for one reason or another, your freezer and refrigerators do not work, which puts all the food in your place of business at risk. Without safe food to serve to customers, your restaurant, bar or catering business cannot operate and has the potential to lose a large amount of money, depending on how long the outage lasts.
Food Contamination
Because more than 75-million Americans get sick from food contamination each year, it is a real threat to any business in the hospitality industry. Contaminated food means food that is laden with bacteria or parasites, both of which can make customers sick. Depending on the level of contamination, restaurants, bars and catering companies can be forced to stop serving certain types of food, close their restaurant, bar or other establishment for a specified period of time or even lose the establishment all together.
The Costs of Food Contamination and Spoilage
The largest risk for businesses that are subjected to food spoilage is the financial ruin. Contamination and spoilage cannot be pre-determined, which means businesses could be taken completely off guard and unprepared for such circumstances. In order to handle the effects of food contamination or spoilage, restaurants, bars and catering businesses should have a food contamination policy on their hospitality insurance policy.
Food Contamination in the News
Any wide spread case of food contamination and spoilage is typically made well-known in the news. With the public being on heightened awareness of such issues, any consumers are likely to seek legal assistance when they are subjected to food-borne illnesses. It is for this reason businesses need to have proper coverage on their hospitality insurance to cover cases of food-borne illness from spoilage and contamination.
If you would like more information about food spoilage coverage on your hospitality insurance, visit RSI-Insurance.com.