Short answer: there is no blanket legal requirement in Türkiye to insure an event, but a policy becomes compulsory in three situations. First, fairs. Article 18 of the Procedures and Principles for Organising Domestic Fairs requires the organiser to take out third-party liability insurance for every fair; the minimum limits published by TOBB Fuarcılık, effective 17 July 2023, are TRY 100,000 bodily injury per person, TRY 500,000 bodily injury per event and TRY 100,000 property damage per event. Second, fireworks and any use of flammable or explosive material, which fall under the compulsory Hazardous Materials and Hazardous Waste Liability Insurance. Third, contract: most hotels, convention centres and municipal sites will not hand over a space without seeing a policy. Liability stays with you even where insurance does not. Article 66 of the Turkish Code of Obligations imposes organisational liability on enterprises, and Article 71 sets out strict liability for enterprises that pose significant danger. Below: which policy covers what, what the general conditions in force since 1959 exclude, the communicable disease exclusion in cancellation cover, the lines to check on a supplier certificate and the five-day notice clock after an accident.
Is event insurance mandatory in Türkiye?
No single compulsory product called event insurance exists in Turkish legislation. What the market sells under that name is a package: third-party liability, employer's liability, equipment cover, event cancellation and personal accident, assembled to fit the job. A dealer meeting, a product launch or a year-end party carries no general insurance requirement. The obligation arrives by three routes. Fair legislation asks for a policy outright. Activities involving flammable, combustible and explosive material fall under a compulsory liability policy. The third route is contract: the venue, the sponsor or a public authority makes the policy a condition of releasing the space. That third route is the one most teams actually meet, and the limits are written by the counterparty rather than by law. Before signing a space allocation letter, read the required limit and which days the policy has to cover.
Organising a fair? The policy is compulsory under Article 18
Article 18 of the Procedures and Principles for Organising Domestic Fairs is unambiguous: the organiser must take out third-party liability insurance for each fair, covering the matters determined by the Union. The Union here is TOBB. The minimum limits published by TOBB Fuarcılık and effective from 17 July 2023 are TRY 100,000 bodily injury per person, TRY 500,000 bodily injury per event and TRY 100,000 property damage per event. The policy, together with proof that the premium has been paid in full, goes to the chamber or commodity exchange where the application was made within fifteen days of the fair closing. The penalty is written down as well: where an organiser is found not to have taken out the insurance, half of its security deposit is transferred to the Union. The same rules state that the Union bears no responsibility for physical risks at the fair site, fire, natural disaster, sabotage or accidents. Treat those figures as a floor. At a fair with ten thousand visitors, TRY 500,000 of bodily injury cover per event can run out on a single collapsed stand.
Fireworks or flammable material? One policy is compulsory
The general conditions of the Hazardous Materials and Hazardous Waste Compulsory Liability Insurance define the scope plainly: natural or synthetic, solid, liquid or gaseous, any production, storage, transport, sale or use of flammable, combustible, explosive and caustic material obliges the natural or legal person carrying out that activity to hold the policy. Cover extends to bodily and property damage suffered by third parties as a result of accidents during the activity, whether or not the insured was at fault, within the limits written in the policy. The heads of cover are itemised: death, permanent disability and medical expenses per person and per accident, property damage per accident. Pyrotechnic articles sit inside the scope, with flares, signal rockets, fireworks and festival sparklers listed except where sold at retail. On site this turns into one habit. Ask the pyrotechnics contractor for the policy itself, not the name of an insurer. Policy number, validity dates and limits should all be visible. The same applies to whoever brings LPG cylinders for stage heaters.
Liability that stays even without a policy: Articles 66 and 71
Skipping insurance does not remove liability. Under Article 66 of the Turkish Code of Obligations, a person who employs others must compensate damage the employee causes to others while performing the assigned work. There is a defence: an employer who proves it took the necessary care in selecting the employee, giving instructions, and supervising and monitoring the work is not liable. The third paragraph of the same article raises the bar for enterprises. Anyone employing staff within an enterprise is liable for damage caused by that enterprise's activities unless it proves the enterprise's working arrangements were suitable for preventing the damage. This provision, known in Turkish doctrine as organisational liability, means care in hiring is not enough on its own; the build itself has to be defensible. Article 71 goes further. Where damage arises from the activity of an enterprise posing significant danger, the owner and, where applicable, the operator are jointly and severally liable, with no requirement of fault. Whether an enterprise meets that definition is assessed by the judge, looking at the nature of the work and the materials, tools and forces used in it. In event production the factors that push the assessment that way are easy to list: truss and chain hoists flown from the ceiling, temporary grandstands, pyrotechnics, generators and work at height. A build file holding load calculations, certificates and briefing records is the defence that comes before any policy.
Which policy covers what?
Separating five covers gets you further than a one-line assurance that everyone is insured. Third-party liability answers claims brought against you when a guest is injured or property belonging to a third party is damaged. Employer's liability responds to a workplace accident involving your own staff and is written with the Social Security Institution's recourse claims in mind; you need it separately, because the third-party policy excludes claims by people bound to the insured through a service relationship. Equipment cover deals with damage to and transport of the sound system, lighting fixtures, LED screen and staging you rent. Event cancellation insurance targets costs incurred and expected net profit when an event is cancelled, postponed, interrupted or moved to another venue. Personal accident sets a per-person sum for attendees or volunteer crew. On a tight budget the usual order runs like this: third-party and employer's liability first, equipment cover according to what the rental contract demands, cancellation cover where there is revenue at risk.
What the third-party policy leaves out
The general conditions of Third-Party Liability Insurance came into force on 6 April 1959, and the exclusion list in Article 3 still lands squarely in the middle of event work. Four items matter most. Claims by people bound to the insured through a service or agency relationship are excluded, so your own technician falling from the stage is not paid under this policy. Third-party goods in the insured's hands or under its supervision through loan, lease or deposit, or for safekeeping, transport or repair, are excluded, and the LED screen and sound system you rent sit inside that definition. Damage caused by the insured and its staff to the building and land where they work is excluded, so the forklift that scars a ballroom floor or the hole drilled into a wall is not paid from here. Claims resting on a contract that go beyond the insured's legal liability are excluded too, which means the penalty clause you signed does not come out of the policy. War, revolt, uprising and strike are outside cover, as are acts of terror and sabotage under Law No. 3713. The same article lists risks that can be bought back by endorsement: liability arising from earthquake, flooding, landslide, explosion, fire, smoke and water, plus lift liability. Note that fire and explosion liability is not part of standard cover. If the programme has candles, flame effects or open fire, do not bind a policy without asking about that endorsement.
What event cancellation insurance covers and excludes
Cancellation policies are built around costs incurred and expected net profit when an event is cancelled, postponed, cut short or relocated, and most also pick up the extra cost of moving it to another date. On the exclusion side the pandemic left a permanent mark. According to an ASAE analysis published in February 2021, insurers widened the exclusion before the end of January 2020 from COVID-19 specifically to any claim arising from communicable disease. The same piece gives the pricing picture: for association events in the United States, a rate of 0.003 applied to budgeted gross revenue rose to somewhere between 0.006 and 0.011 depending on the carrier, an increase of 100 to 400 percent. Communicable disease cover today comes only through a separate buy-back endorsement, usually conditioned on a declaration by the World Health Organization or a government agency. Two things are worth knowing upfront. Ticket or registration sales falling short of forecast is a commercial risk and cancellation cover does not answer it. A policy is bound before the risk is known, so nobody sells you rain cover with the forecast already in your hand. Raise cancellation cover the week the budget is approved, not the week of the event.
Supplier certificates, the five-day clock and what the underwriter needs
The venue, the sound and lighting company, the caterer and the security team each holding a policy does not protect you by itself; a policy protects its own insured and does nothing to change where you stand under Article 66. When you ask for a certificate, read these lines: does the policy period cover build and derig days, are the limits per event or an annual aggregate, what is the deductible, does the activity description in the policy actually include the work being done, is the use of subcontractors covered, and is there proof the premium was paid. Premium is not a detail. Article 6 of the general conditions states that unless agreed otherwise, the insurer's liability does not begin until the premium or the first instalment is paid, even if the policy has been handed over. If an accident happens, the clock is short. Article 7 requires the insured to notify the insurer in writing within five days of learning of an event that could give rise to liability, with the place, date, time, cause, the dead and injured and the property damaged all set out. Article 8 requires court papers, formal notices and service documents to be passed on immediately without waiting to be asked, and any information the insurer requests in writing to be sent within eight days. It also forbids the mistake made most often on site: without the insurer's express permission, the insured may not accept a claim even in part, and may not pay compensation. Article 10 closes the door on an insured who ignores these duties. Changes that aggravate the risk after the contract is signed must be reported within eight days, and a pyrotechnics segment added late or extra weight going up to the ceiling falls exactly there. When you go out for a quote, give the underwriter the dates and times, whether the site is indoor or outdoor, expected attendance, stage and rigging loads, LED screen area, any pyrotechnics and lasers, alcohol service, generator and marquee details, the supplier list, the total budget and the expected revenue. Tales Event is based in İstanbul and delivers stage, sound, lighting and LED screen production for dealer meetings, launches, openings, gala nights and graduation ceremonies across Türkiye with a single crew. Send us your date, the venue and the programme, and we will build the risk file for the underwriter alongside the production plan.
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