Raising The Bar On Intercollegiate Sports Insurance

It’s no surprise that Intercollegiate sports programs are big business with big responsibilities to the student-athletes, the school’s reputation, and the bottom line. Perhaps no one knows that as well as athletic trainers like you who have the health and welfare of both the players and the school as part of your official and unofficial job descriptions.

When you consider schools across the U.S. average approximately 12,500 sports injuries a year with the cost of contact sport injuries estimated to range from $446 million to $1.5 billion per year, keeping athletes and budgets healthy calls for a careful risk management focus. But who can provide it? Fortunately, the right insurance partner can help manage your many financial and injury exposures.

Colleges and Universities Get Solutions to Sports Program Accident Claims

With nearly 40 years providing accident protection for K-12 and intercollegiate students and athletes, A-G Administrators knows a thing or two about the risks you face, starting with accidents.

“While accidents can happen at any time, anywhere, accident insurance is always there, making sure that student-athletes and their families don’t face unexpected, expensive out-of-pocket medical costs,” says James Shipp, ATC, Chief Marketing Officer, A-G Administrators. “Without the coverage, families may face financial crises, while schools can face negative press and potential liability claims. An affordable accident policy can remove the threats of these consequences.”

A-G Starts with Accident Insurance

A-G offers secondary injury, catastrophic injury, and participant injury policies that can each be adapted to your program’s needs. “With these three plans in place, there are almost never any out-of-pocket expenses for student-athletes or schools,” Shipp says.

1. Secondary Injury or Excess Accident Injury Insurance

This plan ensures student-athletes have no gap in their personal coverage before reaching catastrophic plan insurance deductibles ($25,000 for the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA), $35,000 for the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletes (NAIA), or $90,000 for the NCAA). The coverage offers:

• Fully insured, per claim, and aggregate deductible options
• One year, two, or three years and beyond benefit periods
• Expanded coverage for overuse, repetitive stress, and overexertion injuries
• Expanded coverage for heart and circulatory issues, and more

2. Catastrophic Injury Insurance

This plan works in tandem with the NCAA, NAIA, and NJCAA’s requirements. The NCAA catastrophic insurance plan carries a $90,000 deductible, while the NJCAA’s plan has a $25,000 deductible and the NAIA’s plan has a $35,000 deductible. A-G’s programs carry lifetime benefits and can include:

• Five-year, ten-year, or lifetime benefit options
• Catastrophic maximums from $1-$10 million
• Flexible deductible options
• Benefits for total and partial disability, and more

3. Participant Injury Insurance

This coverage is for injuries that occur at officially sponsored activities hosted by your program. It can be tailored to meet your needs and may include:

• Fully insured, per claim, and aggregate deductible options
• One, two, or three year benefit periods
• Coverage for travel to and from officially-sanctioned events, and more

With accident insurance plans like these from A-G, you can relax knowing that financial repercussions from injuries won’t get in the way of your athletes’ recovery.

But there is one other important thing that A-G has learned working so closely with programs like yours over the years: risk management also plays a critical role in a responsible program.

A-G Helps Enhance Your Program With Risk Management Services

You, as an athletic trainer, are in a unique position to understand the benefits of both elements, because you know the value of preventative measures — such strengthening programs — along with careful planning and monitoring to help reduce and eliminate risk.

Our Risk Management Solutions Include:

• Risk Consulting to proactively manage your student-athletes injuries on a case-by-case basis.
• A-G, in partnership with the Fairly Group and Occunet, streamlines claims management with a single point of contact, pre-negotiates contracts with medical partners and case agreements when needed, arranges referrals outside of the network, and facilitates referrals to high-end and concierge-level sports medicine specialists
• An RxBridge partnership to effectively monitor and manage prescriptions
• Cardiac Screenings with Athletic Heart to provide you with affordable, scalable, and specialized diagnostic imaging
• A Sparta Science partnership to measure and minimize an athlete’s injury risk, speed effective rehabilitation, and return-to- play timelines, with:
• 48% reduction in surgeries
• 45% annual reduction in insurance claims
• 21% injury reduction each year.
• Maximizing Medical Partnerships with PPO networks and negotiating to save money on medical expenses

Raising The Bar On Sports Insurance With A-G Can Lower Expenses — More Than 50% Annually — And Let You Get Back To Training

50% is the claims savings a Northeast school with a football program realized after changing to A-G and experiencing our unique program management and discounting strategy. Another school realized a 25% reduction in premium payments. “Neither of these schools is unique — it’s just what happens when we put EGBAR to work,” Shipp explains.

EGBAR is our proprietary Efficiency Generating Business Automation Resource claims management application that provides instant access to claims information and builds relationships to cut through administrative red tape.

EGBAR helps save time and money for athletic programs — and, perhaps most importantly, allows you to get back to training if you’ve been stuck managing insurance claims.

Find Out Why A-G Administrators Has A 98% Customer Satisfaction Rating

Talk to your Athletic Director and then talk to us or your agent about how we can transform your athletes’ accident risk and experience with our products and services. All you need to do is start here to get the ball rolling. We look forward to talking soon.