The moment ore becomes concentrate, and concentrate becomes cargo, the risk changes. Valuable and precious metals in transit face a different threat profile to the mine itself — theft, hijacking, handling damage and total loss during movement. We place cover across every leg of the journey, by land, air and sea.
Valuable metal shipments frequently move across more than one mode between mine gate and buyer, refinery or port. Cover is placed on a transit basis so it responds continuously across the full route.
Inland transit cover for road and rail movement, including high-risk corridors, security-vehicle requirements and hijack exposure.
Cover for precious cargo moving by air, including ground handling and airside risk before and after flight.
Marine cargo cover for export shipments, including port storage, loading/offloading and ocean transit.
A single transit policy structured to follow cargo seamlessly across mode changes, avoiding gaps at handover points.
High-value, high-liquidity cargo carries elevated theft exposure — cover terms are matched to route risk and security protocols in place.
Loss or damage during loading, offloading, and interim storage at depots, ports or airside facilities.
Sums insured structured to reflect metal price movement between dispatch and delivery, not a fixed value at shipment date.
Extensions available for cross-border movement through jurisdictions with elevated political or civil unrest exposure.
Broadly yes — goods in transit insurance is the common South African name for cover on cargo while it is being moved, and that is what this is. The distinction worth drawing is value and route: a standard goods in transit policy written for general freight is rated for ordinary cargo on ordinary routes. Concentrate, doré and refined metal carry a theft profile and a value per load that need the security conditions, limits per conveyance and valuation basis set deliberately rather than taken from a general wording.
That is set by the policy's transit clause, and it matters more than most schedules suggest. Cover typically attaches when goods leave the named point of origin and ends on delivery at the named destination, but loading, offloading, interim storage and consolidation are where disputes arise. We define those points explicitly for the routes a mine actually uses.
Declaring a fixed value for a shipment whose worth moves daily creates exposure in both directions. Transit programmes for valuable metals are normally written to respond to value at the time of loss, within an agreed limit per conveyance, with a declaration process that keeps the sum insured aligned to the market rather than to a figure agreed months earlier.
It can be, and for high-value cargo it is the exposure that drives the rate. Insurers will generally require security conditions — escort arrangements, tracking, route and timing controls, driver vetting — and cover responds subject to those conditions being met. Establishing what is required, and whether current practice satisfies it, is part of placing the risk.
Not necessarily, and separate policies per leg is where cargo tends to fall through the gap — typically at the handover between road, sea and air. A combined transit policy written to follow the cargo from mine gate to final destination keeps one insurer responsible across the whole journey, which removes the argument about which leg a loss occurred on.
