How a Plymouth canoe club found and closed four gaps in its insurance
Lowenna Pascoe is secretary of Tamar Reach Canoe Club, a volunteer-run club founded in 1987 that paddles the River Tamar from a boathouse near Saltash Passage in Plymouth, with 112 members, 71 of them juniors. In May 2024, a parent helper slipped on the slipway carrying a kayak, broke his wrist and asked what the club's insurance would cover. Nobody on the committee could tell him.
TL;DR
Tamar Reach relied on the insurance that came with its governing body affiliation and had never read the policy. When a parent helper who was not a registered member broke his wrist, the club found he was outside its personal accident cover. Lowenna read the full wording and found four gaps: unregistered helpers, two coaches with lapsed awards, uninsured boats and an open event the policy might not cover. Over the 2024-25 season every regular helper was registered, every coach was back in date, six policies and certificates got a named owner and a renewal task in Bitir, and the extra cover cost £612 a year.
Lowenna Pascoe
Club Secretary · Tamar Reach Canoe Club, Plymouth
Where the club started
Lowenna, a practice manager at a GP surgery in Plymouth, started paddling with her son in 2018 and became club secretary in 2022. The club runs junior sessions on Saturday mornings, adult paddles on Wednesday evenings in summer and an open paddle every September that brings in about 140 entrants from the public.
It has no paid staff. Thirteen volunteer coaches lead sessions, and a group of parents carry boats, run the safety bank and make the tea. Before 2024 the club's insurance arrangements looked like this:
- Cover came through affiliation to its governing body, renewed with the fee each January.
- The certificate was sent to the hall and the harbour authority when they asked, and otherwise lived in the previous secretary's email.
- Nobody had read the full policy wording. The committee worked from a one-page summary.
- Coach awards were tracked in a spreadsheet the head coach updated when he remembered.
What happened on the slipway?
On a Saturday in May 2024, a parent who had helped at junior sessions every week for two years slipped on weed at the bottom of the slipway while carrying a sea kayak with another adult. He broke his left wrist. He is a self-employed electrician, and after six weeks off work he asked the club, politely, whether its insurance paid anything.
Lowenna found the policy wording that evening. The personal accident section covered registered members. He had never joined.
He did not pursue a claim, and he still helps on Saturdays. But reading the policy to answer him showed Lowenna that he was not the only gap.
"He'd done more for the juniors than half the committee, and the honest answer was that we'd never checked whether he was covered. I'd been sending the certificate to the harbour office every year without knowing what was on page two."
What did the policy review find?
Lowenna went through the full wording with the club's treasurer over two evenings, using the checklist in our guide to insurance for clubs and classes. She also read the HSE's brief guide to employers' liability insurance to check whether the club needed it. Because nobody is paid, it did not. They found four gaps:
- Nine regular helpers were not members. None of the parents who carried boats or ran the bank had ever registered.
- Two of 13 coaches had lapsed awards. One had expired seven months earlier, and the policy tied coaching cover to a current award.
- The boats were not insured. The club's 14 boats and its trailer, about £18,600 to replace, were covered for liability but not for theft or damage.
- The open paddle was a grey area. With 140 members of the public on the water, it was not clear the event counted as a recognised club activity.
What Lowenna set up in Bitir
The committee agreed the changes in June 2024, and the club moved its members and volunteers onto Bitir for the summer season.
- A free volunteer membership. Every regular helper now joins as a volunteer member before their second session, which brings them inside the affiliation cover.
- Award expiry dates on coach profiles. The welfare officer and head coach can see them; parents and juniors cannot.
- Dated renewal tasks. Each of six policies and certificates has a committee owner and a task due one month before it expires.
- A committee channel for documents. Certificates, the policy wording and the insurer's letter confirming volunteer cover are posted there, so the next secretary inherits them.
- Same-day incident reports. Coaches log any injury or near miss before leaving the boathouse, following our guide to accident and incident reporting.
Separately, a broker added equipment cover and a one-day event policy for the open paddle, for £612 a year in total. The two coaches booked refresher courses and stopped leading sessions until they passed, which both did by August.
What changed in the numbers?
Lowenna compared the club's position in May 2024 with May 2025.
The helper count grew because asking every new helper to register made the club notice how many it really had. The higher incident count does not mean more injuries: the club now writes down near misses it used to shrug off, such as a junior capsizing near the moorings.
"The renewal tasks are the bit that matters long term. I won't be secretary forever, and the next person shouldn't have to find out what we're insured for the way I did."
What Lowenna does in Bitir
- Member profiles for coaches, with award expiry dates visible only to the welfare officer and head coach.
- Dated tasks for each policy and certificate renewal, assigned to the committee member who owns it.
- A committee-only channel holding certificates, policy wording and the insurer's letter on volunteer cover.
- Roles that keep coaching and welfare records away from parents and juniors.
- The session register, so the club can show exactly who was on the water on any given day.
What she would tell another club
- Get the full policy wording, not the summary, and read the exclusions.
- Register every regular helper as a member, even for free.
- Track coach award expiry dates somewhere the committee can see them.
- Give every renewal a named owner and a reminder a month ahead.
- Do it before someone gets hurt.
What's next
For 2025-26 the club is adding a one-page insurance register to its AGM papers, so members can see what the club is covered for and who owns each renewal. Lowenna is also working with the head coach on a written risk assessment for the slipway, which the insurer asked about at renewal.
Questions we're asked about this case
Why was the parent helper not covered?
The club's insurance came through its governing body affiliation, and its personal accident section only covered registered members. The helper had carried boats at junior sessions every Saturday for two years but had never joined the club, so he fell outside it. Any liability claim would have depended on proving the club was at fault.
What were the four gaps?
Nine regular parent helpers were not registered members; two of 13 coaches had awards that had lapsed, one by seven months; the club's 14 boats and trailer, worth about £18,600 to replace, were not insured against theft or damage; and the annual open paddle event, with about 140 entrants from the public, was not clearly a recognised activity under the policy.
How much did closing the gaps cost?
Registering helpers cost nothing, because the club created a free volunteer membership category. Equipment cover and a one-day event policy for the open paddle added £612 a year through a broker. The two coaches paid for their own refresher courses and the club reimbursed them from its training budget.
Does the club need employers' liability insurance?
No. Tamar Reach has no paid staff, and the legal duty to hold employers' liability cover only applies to clubs that employ someone. The club asked its insurer to confirm in writing that volunteers are covered under its public liability section, and keeps that letter with its certificates.
Know what your club is covered for
Put every renewal on a dated task with a named owner, keep coach award dates on their profiles and hold certificates in a committee-only channel the next secretary inherits.
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