Insurance

Are you insured properly?

Well, I ran into an interesting set of problems recently that taught me a few things about managing my business. I have equipment insurance and business liability insurance, but I never really looked at the medical side. Not medical insurance, which I have, but what happens to my affairs and my business if I have a medical issue?

I hit a few medical problems that became a little more serious than I expected and resulted in me spending a few days in the hospital, having a healthy bit of surgery, and a few more days recovering at home. I'm fine now, although I still have some more tests to get done, but they are just followup tests.

I'm not writing this post to talk about my medical adventures, but rather a risk to my business. How's that? Isn't my business separate from myself. Isn't that why I formed a company? Well, not quite, as you are unlikely to be able to completely separate yourself from your business. In the legal sense, your company is separate from your business, but not in the practical sense. Why? You are likely the most valuable asset in your business and the primary means for generating income.

Life gets interesting if something goes wrong with that business asset that is you.

What happens if you get sick or, even worse, pass away? Most single people think this is non-issue, as they have no dependents (usually), but that's wrong. Let's walk around this one.

Suppose you are sick, injured, or otherwise incapacitated, who makes medical decisions for you? I'm not talking about life or death ER decisions. I'm talking about the advocating for you while you're there and deciding between treatment options.

If you're married, this person is likely your wife or husband. If you're living with someone, regardless of how long, they are NOT able to make these decisions. I know this because I'm in that situation and I talked to my lawyer (ask yours). You need a medical power of attorney document, signed and witnessed, to make sure your significant other can watch out for you.

Same situation, how does your wife, husband, or person you're living with pay the bills, both for your business and the household itself. If you can't sign things and you haven't dealt with this, bad things can happen. You need ANOTHER document, called property power of attorney (or sometimes just power of attorney) to make sure someone is allowed to make financial decisions for yourself and your company. Some people use their spouse, some people use their attorney, some people use their business partner (you can limit to just personal or business or even both). In any case, someone needs to be assigned this or your business will come to a grinding halt.

Worst case scenario - you die. If you don't have a will, the state assigns someone to decide what to do with you assets. There is a good chance you would not like their decisions. You need a will. Not a home kit form like I had, but a real will, written by a lawyer, signed by you and witnessed. You do not get a second chance with these things, so do it right.

If you have a spouse (married or living together), typically you give everything to the other. However, you may have some specific things you want to give to specific people. This goes in your will. Fine, but what happens to your business? This REALLY needs to go into your will. What happens if your spouse passes away first or at the same time? Morbid thought, but this REALLY needs to go in your will.

The legal issues are different in different areas, so talk to your lawyer (If you don't have one, get one).You need to look into:

- Medical power of attorney
- property power of attorney
- your will

I had to take care of this while under fire and dealing with significant medical issues . If you don't have these three documents, I urge you to take the time now to address this issue and get it done. These are like parachutes. If you wait until you really need them, it's probably too late.

Protecting Your Assets

Well, I try to update this blog on a weekly basis, but life sometimes gets in the way and it's been several weeks since the last update.

Nonetheless, I thought I would share some advice for the photographers out there who may be reading. One of the biggest challenges of modern photography is protecting your digital assets. This is otherwise known as Digital Asset Management (DAM).

First, a book recommendation - go get a copy of "The DAM Book" by Peter Krogh from O'Reilly (ISBN# 0-596-10018-3). This is probably the standard text for understanding both the technology and the issues involved with proper digital management. This is not a simple subject, but it does break up into nice simple to understand parts. Taken in pieces, it's pretty easy to look at your own requirements and make informed decisions.



Peter Krogh also has an excellent website supporting readers of his book:
http://www.thedambook.com/

One of the big elements to proper Digital Asset Management is making sure you have backup copies of everything of value. If you're shooting as a hobby the loss of your work is heart breaking. If you're shooting for a living, it's professionally fatal. Clients generally do not accept any excuse for the loss of their work, nor should they.

I have multiple copies of everything on multiple drives, usually in three different places. I'll talk more about my office data management in a future post, but challenge of my own DAM is how to protect myself from theft or loss. For example, some miserable soul, breaks in and steals my equipment. Everything is insured, but what happens when they steal my harddrives and backup harddrives? As well, what happens if there is a fire or other event that damages my office.

Everything is replaceable under my insurance policy, but I can't get my data back. Scary thought, losing thousands upon thousands of photographs, never to be able to replace them.

My first solution, was to backup my data onto removable hardrives and simply put them in a safety deposit box. I do this once a quarter and might increase this to once a month, but I am still exposed between bank visits. Some shooters I know keep the backup disks at home and the studio.

Now I'm taking advantage of the services of Photoshelter. This company was formed to focus specifically on the storage requirements of photographers and offer an online storage from 100MB to over a terabyte. I'm currently chewing into a terabyte, but I can upload a shoot as soon as I complete it and access these files form anywhere in the world. I'm still bringing all of my files online, but I'm pretty happy with this solution and their customer service.

More info here