Hazardous Activity in Accident Insurance (Wagnis)
A hazardous activity (Wagnis) in Swiss accident insurance is an act by which the insured person exposes himself or herself to a particularly great danger without taking, or being able to take, the precautions that would limit the risk to a reasonable level; cash benefits for non-occupational accidents resulting from such an activity are reduced by half and refused in particularly serious cases.
Legal Basis
Art. 39 UVG authorises the Federal Council to designate extraordinary dangers and hazardous activities that, in the insurance of non-occupational accidents, lead to refusal of all benefits or reduction of cash benefits. Art. 50 UVV defines the hazardous activity and provides that cash benefits – daily allowances and pensions, but not medical treatment – are reduced by half and refused in particularly serious cases; rescue actions in favour of persons remain insured even where they would in themselves constitute a hazardous activity. Art. 49 UVV separately regulates extraordinary dangers such as foreign military service, participation in brawls or the commission of crimes.
Absolute and Relative Hazardous Activities
Case law and practice distinguish two categories. Absolute hazardous activities are pursuits whose dangers cannot be reduced to a reasonable level even under the most favourable circumstances, or which are not worthy of protection – Suva cites base jumping, speedflying, downhill racing, motorcycle and car racing, boxing bouts or diving deeper than 40 metres as examples. Relative hazardous activities arise where an activity that is in itself insured but risky is carried out in serious disregard of the usual rules and precautions, such as climbing without protection, off-piste skiing at considerable avalanche risk or canyoning in flood conditions. The lists are not exhaustive; each case is assessed on its circumstances.
Practical Relevance
Since the reduction affects only mandatory accident insurance, athletes close the resulting gap through private accident or sports insurance. Market practice in Swiss UVG supplementary contracts is a module “cover for gross negligence, extraordinary dangers and hazardous activities” under which the insurer pays the UVG reductions and itself waives any reduction; exclusions for offences, crimes and foreign military service remain. Private accident insurance in Germany and Austria has no general concept of hazardous activity; wordings instead use specific exclusion lists – for instance pilots of air sports equipment, motor sport competitions, national and international ski and sports competitions including training – together with notification duties or loadings for particularly dangerous sports. International PA wordings typically exclude professional sports, roped climbing, hang gliding, bungee jumping, parachuting and any racing other than on foot. For underwriters of group and sports schemes, enquiring about the activities pursued is therefore a key risk parameter.
Legal basis
- CH: Art. 39 UVG
- CH: Art. 49 and 50 UVV