What drone insurance covers, and what the word covers

Drone insurance covers four different things under one word, and a policy may include any combination of them. Third party liability is the core: it answers for what the aircraft does to a person or to property that is not yours. Hull cover, sometimes called accidental damage, answers for the aircraft itself when it comes down. Theft and loss cover answers for a machine stolen from a car or lost over water. Equipment cover extends to the controller, the goggles, the batteries and the cases. Only the first of those is the one the requirements have anything to say about.

The word cover does a great deal of work in advertising and very little of it is precise. A policy that pays for a broken aircraft and nothing else is described as drone insurance and so is a policy that pays a claimant a large sum and leaves the owner to replace the machine themselves. They answer opposite questions.

Who the insurance requirement falls on

The compulsory insurance requirement falls on operations rather than on people, and the two attributes that pull an operation into it are purpose and mass. Flying for a commercial purpose, which includes work done for payment or in the course of a business, is the ordinary trigger. Aircraft above a mass threshold are the other, and that threshold sits well above the 250 gram boundary that decides the identifiers, so a reader who has learned the 250 gram figure has not learned this one. A person flying a small machine for their own recreation generally falls outside both, which is why a hobby flyer can complete the whole of the registration process without ever being asked for a policy.

What falls on the individual regardless is liability itself. Insurance is a way of meeting a liability, not a way of avoiding one, and a recreational flyer who puts an aircraft through a conservatory roof owes for the roof whether or not a policy exists. That is the reason the question is worth taking seriously by somebody the requirements do not reach. Registering a drone records who is answerable for a machine; it does not fund the answer.

What arranging cover asks of you, in order

1. Establish the purpose of your flying, since recreation and commercial work are treated differently and a single paid job changes the answer.
2. Weigh the aircraft as it flies, because mass is the second attribute the compulsory requirement turns on.
3. Decide which of the four categories you actually want, rather than accepting a bundle described only as cover.
4. Check the policies you already hold, since household contents and some membership schemes reach further than owners expect.
5. Read the exclusions before the price, because the exclusions are what decide whether a policy answers on the day.
6. Record the aircraft's serial number, weight and operator identifier, since an insurer will ask for them at the point of a claim.

The routes a hobby flyer usually takes are three. The first is membership of a national model flying association, several of which include third party liability cover for members as part of the subscription and have done for decades. The second is a specialist policy from a broker dealing in unmanned aircraft, bought annually or, in some schemes, by the day for a single flight. The third is an extension to an existing household or gadget policy, which is the cheapest route and the one most likely to exclude the thing that matters. No product is recommended here and no insurer is named, on this page or anywhere on this site.

Cost is the question every reader arrives with and the one this page will not answer with a figure. Premiums for this kind of cover move with the sum insured, the weight and value of the aircraft, the purpose of the flying and the claims history, and any single number quoted here would be wrong for most readers and out of date for the rest. The honest form of the answer is the shape: association membership bundles liability cover into a subscription that also buys other things, day cover is the smallest commitment available, and commercial cover with a substantial liability limit is the most expensive band by a wide margin.

Where the insurance requirement does not apply

The compulsory insurance requirement does not apply to ordinary recreational flying of a small machine, which is the position the great majority of readers are in, and saying so plainly is more useful than hedging it. A person flying a sub 250 gram drone in a park for their own enjoyment is not being asked for a policy by the CAA scheme, and no part of the registration process demands one.

The question does arise, in practice rather than in law, in three places that catch people out. Landowners and councils that permit flying on their ground frequently ask to see third party liability cover as a condition. Model flying sites and clubs ask as a condition of membership. And an event organiser, a wedding party or anybody commissioning footage will ask, because their own insurers require it of them. In each of those the requirement is contractual rather than regulatory, and it is no less real for that.

Cover also stops at the edges of the policy rather than at the edge of the flight. Flights outside the United Kingdom, flights beyond the published height ceiling of 400 feet, which is 120 metres, flights outside the airspace requirements, racing and competition flying, and flights made with a lapsed registration are common exclusions. A policy that excludes flying outside the published requirements pays nothing on the flight most likely to produce a claim, which is the argument for flying inside them quite apart from the requirements themselves. The UK rules, in order sets out the requirements a policy of this kind will assume you were working to.

The confusions worth clearing up

The first confusion is between registration and insurance. Registering with the CAA scheme records who is responsible for an aircraft. It transfers no risk, funds no claim and is not a policy. A reader who has registered has done the administrative thing and not the financial one. The drone licence question deals with the identifiers, and this page deals with the money.

The second is the belief that a manufacturer's own care plan is insurance. Refresh and replacement schemes sold with a machine typically repair or replace the aircraft, which is hull cover under another name, and typically say nothing at all about a third party. Somebody who buys one and believes they are covered for a claim from a stranger has bought the wrong half. The third is that household contents cover extends to a drone away from the home as a matter of course. Some policies extend to personal possessions away from the premises and many exclude aircraft by name, so the answer sits in the wording rather than in the general shape of the product.

Does your own flying call for cover?

To work out whether your flying calls for cover, ask three questions in order. Is any of it done for payment or in the course of a business, which is the attribute that pulls an operation into the compulsory requirement. What does the aircraft weigh, which is the second attribute. And where do you fly, since the landowner or the club may ask for a certificate even where the law does not. A recreational flyer answering no, light and anywhere public will usually find no requirement, and will still be personally liable for what the aircraft does.

This page describes what the categories of cover are and where a hobby flyer usually finds one. It is not financial advice, it does not recommend a product or an insurer, and it does not interpret an insurance requirement for any particular person or flight. The Civil Aviation Authority publishes the requirements that apply to this kind of flying, including where insurance is compulsory, and the CAA revises them, so the current position is the one set out on the CAA's own pages.

Where to go next

RULESThe UK rules, in orderWhat the law asks of a hobby flyerRULESThe drone licence questionDo you need a drone licence in the UK?RULESRegistering a droneWho has to register