Richard Thompson: Insurance Brokers

The biggest story in 2009 for our Antiquarian Booksellers Scheme was Defective Title. At least two book thefts have become high profile having been well reported in the national press. Articles have been published about David Slade, sentenced for 24 months for taking books from the estate of Sir Evelyn de Rothschild and selling them through Dominic Winter Auctions. Farhad Hakimzadeh, an Iranian businessman and book collector was, earlier in the year, given a two year sentence for cutting out and taking pages from antiquarian books in the British and Bodleian Libraries over a seven year period.

Richard Thompson Insurance has been heavily involved in these incidents as five of our clients purchased stolen books and therefore received letters from the Rothschild's estate requesting the return of the books. The books, under UK Law must be returned, and so we are thankful that each of our clients were fully covered under the Defective Title wording of their policies provided through the Antiquarian Booksellers Association Insurance Scheme.

Although claims have been unusually high in 2009 the scheme is still running successfully. Supported fully by our underwriters Hiscox, the largest fine art Underwriter in the world, our binder has dealt large claims following the thefts from the Rotheschild library, settling over £300,000 in defective title claims which saw Richard Thompson clients  remunerated for their losses quickly, generously and without prejudice. Smaller claims on the binder have been dealt with quickly by our office under our claims settling authority. We hope that this system is the quickest and simplest available to any bookseller.