Liabilities of commercial business teaching reloading?

[rookie wildcat]

Another myth - that companies lower their published loads on the advice of their lawyers, and that individuals have been sued for posting unsafe loads. Same idea with reloading manuals and courses - there's always a disclaimer.

I am willing to admit to being wrong if one person can show one example of a successful suit.

I have no problem teaching a basic course, along with a few other people, since I don't do handguns. I am with you, but it seemed to be pretty hard to convince this young man that there is no "MAGIC" involved in reloading. However, in his small store EVERYTHING that is involved in going bang is locked behind glass doors. He has no idea of what he would need to stock for reloading. I mean, that's how this conversation started. He has 1 box of Speer .224 bullets, one pound each of Hodgdon's powder. No brass, no primers. He fully admitted that since he didn't understand reloading (he's a fisherman and a bow hunter and the store shows that), he didn't figure it was much of a business. Since he grew up with the registry, he thinks it was a good thing and it would only be responsible that we should have it back. How do you fix this?

 

[p-17]

lawyers have a vested interest in you getting sued.
insurance providers have a vested interest in you avoiding liability.

I have seen a number of misinformed our downright bone-headed posts on CGN over the years, and I have done my best to ignore them or suggest polite alternatives, but this one is too problematic to ignore.

Lawyers don't have a vested interest to get you sued. Actually, if anything, they have a vested interest in trying to help you avoid getting you sued. This is because if you act on a lawyer's advice and things go sour, the lawyer himself could get sued for negligent advice and/or face disciplinary proceedings from the Law Society. Therefore, lawyers tend to be very conservative in their advice for this reason. However, because they are working for you, they will do the best of their abilities to find creative solutions and loopholes that could benefit you.

Insurance companies, on the other hand, are really only interested in making and keeping money. This means getting as much in premiums as possible and paying out in claims as little as possible. They don't care if they unreasonably prohibit you from doing an activity -- they're still getting their premium. And they don't want to potentially bind themselves to owing you money in the future if things go pear-shaped. They will not try to look for solutions with you; they will only try to look for ways to limit their potential liability for expenses. If that means shutting down your ideas for expanding your business, too bad. The only way they will work with you on this is if they can sell you an additional policy for more money specifically for this activity.

But to help you understand the basic principles of liability that might be associated with this activity, the only one who can give you a legal opinion that is backed by professional status (and insurance) is a lawyer.

 

[popcanhunter]

ok... i suppose a lawyer paid for a consultation has a vested interest in making sure whatever advice he puts in writing is rock solid. but one giving free verbal advice doesnt make a dime until you call him and say "im being sued, can you help?"

insurance companies with a monopoly might act as you have described. but not when there is competition.

i still say disclose everything to several insurance providers, and outsource that risk to the lowest bidder.

 

[dimeN]

inquire into the liability insurance ... it differs alot on company and location

when i wanted insurance for my welding/blacksmith shop... they rated me as medium risk and i was on the same level as a golf course .... 5 to 8000 a year

this was with no public access !


you'd have to find a way for the clients to sign a major disclaimer ...so they can't persue you after .... they assume all the risk ... ( even that i'm told isn't very good protection )

if it were me, sorry to say this but i'd run from the idea of teaching reloading

 

[rookie wildcat]

if it were me, sorry to say this but i'd run from the idea of teaching reloading

Again, not my idea, but the owners idea until liability reared it's head.
dead issue now.

Thanks for all the comments, pretty much what I thought but now supported by other views.