The Strangest Church Insurance Claims of 2025

Can you believe that these insurance claims happened in churches? Our agency assisted with these losses and hundreds more in the past 2 years alone. Bitner Henry Insurance Group provides claims assistance, a team of award-winning service staff, and local agents to provide professional service and support our clients. Here are some of the recent claims we’ve seen!:

• Altar Call: A car drove into the church and skidded stopped just in front of the altar. The woman driving, though impaired, was not injured.
• Squirrel Attack: An employee was on the playground supervising the children when she saw a squirrel attack a small child. She rushed over to grab the squirrel off of the child. While she initially refused treatment (rabies shots), she later reconsidered and started treatment.
• Graveyard Crash: Someone facing a medical issue ran off the road and into headstones at the graveyard- narrowly missing a headstone with his own name. Later, a tow truck (also with his own name) would pick up the vehicle.
• Running on Empty: A church car-care ministry accidentally drained transmission fluid from a vehicle, which then drove about 30 miles without transmission fluid, causing damage to the patron’s car.
• Lawnmower Gone Wrong: A church member volunteered to service the church lawnmower. While they were working on the mower at their home, it caught on fire.
• Pop-Tarts: Three teenage boys broke into the church and elementary building. They stole a speaker, two fire extinuishers, two small balls, and some pop tarts. “They even ate our poptarts!” the claimant told us on the phone.
• Overflow:  The baptistry in the church accidentally ran all night and overflowed, flooding the church
• Steeple Fire: A steeple caught on fire after a bonfire from a neighboring property carried an ember over to it.

• Oversleeper: A church bus dropped children off for a Wednesday evening youth night, but a child fell asleep on the bus. She continued to sleep and was found on the bus as the event concluded, and although she was fine, the church has received a Letter of Rep from the family’s attorney.
• Copper: Both of the AC units of a church were vandalized. The vandals stole the copper wiring out of the units, leaving them unusable. Sometimes vandals strip copper from wires in order to sell it.
• Windy: Strong winds blew a gate at the church hard enough that its latch broke. The gate swung hard, cracking into the windshield of a nearby vehicle.
• Well, Actually: An employee fell into an old indoor well hole while on a mission trip. Although eventually rescued, the experience was jarring for the employee, who was ‘on-the-clock’ during the accident.

• Bumper Cars: While volunteers attempted to load a plastic table into a golf cart, the table pressed down on the gas pedal. The cart began to move forward and hit the front bumper of another car.
• Gone Batty: Employees in a housing unit came into contact with a bat. All underwent a series of vaccinations for rabies.

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