Business closure insurance (BSV) in the Corona crisis

When the authorities decided to close the restaurantsat the end of March 2020, many restaurateurs were sure that this would be a clear case for the business closure insurance schemes. Business closure insurance is a catering industry and hotel industry as well as in all food-processing companies or companies operating in the context of such companies. The insurance, at least in the opinion of many, is intended to cover a agreed costframework in the event of a officially ordered closure of the business, thus ensuring the continued existence of the business. The farm closure insurance is of existential importance for all farms dealing with food, because there is always a risk of disease germs and pathogens finding their way into the company.

In principle, it is also important in the context of the corona crisis that the risk of a infection hazard in the company or the mere suspicion thereof, with the consequence of an official closure of the company , is already insured. For this reason, a business closure insurance should also be sharply separated from a business interruption insurance, as the latter is not affected by the Infection Protection Act.

In contrast to the former, a business interruption insurance policy only ever regulates in the context of a material damage that has occurred, which was also the damage triggering event. Accordingly, a business interruption insurance policy would only regulate the loss incurred and the loss of earnings if, for example, a business is unable to continue production after an explosion. Thus, in the context of the corona crisis, no triggering event with property damage has occurred and the insured person can therefore claim any insurance claim. However, it should be mentioned at this point that business interruption insurance could also be considered for claims settlement, possibly by means of an additional insurance module, so-called extended coverage module or a all-risk policy,.

An individual check of the contracts is absolutely necessary at this point, since, if necessary, epidemic and/or infectious diseases may be expressly named as insured risk. Furthermore, it is possible that the insurance includes all-risk cover, which also covers corona-related losses. This would be interesting insofar as retroactive losses would also be covered, depending on the contract.