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Compensation vs Indemnify - What's the difference?

compensation | indemnify |

As a noun compensation

is the act or principle of compensating.

As a verb indemnify is

to secure against loss or damage; to insure or indemnify can be (obsolete|rare) to hurt, to harm.

compensation

Noun

(en noun)
  • The act or principle of compensating.
  • (Emerson)
  • That which constitutes, or is regarded as, an equivalent; that which makes good the lack or variation of something else; that which compensates for loss or privation; amends; remuneration; recompense.
  • * Hallam
  • The parliament which dissolved the monastic foundations vouchsafed not a word toward securing the slightest compensation to the dispossessed owners.
  • * Burke
  • No pecuniary compensation can possibly reward them.
  • The extinction of debts of which two persons are reciprocally debtors by the credits of which they are reciprocally creditors; the payment of a debt by a credit of equal amount; a set-off.
  • A recompense or reward for some loss or service.
  • An equivalent stipulated for in contracts for the sale of real estate, in which it is customary to provide that errors in description, etc., shall not avoid, but shall be the subject of compensation.
  • The relationship between air temperature outside a building and a calculated target temperature for provision of air or water to contained rooms or spaces for the purpose of efficient heating. In building control systems the compensation curve is defined to a compensator for this purpose.
  • Synonyms

    * (act of compensating) restitution * (recompense or reward) restitution

    Derived terms

    * overcompensation

    indemnify

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (forming verbs'')''Oxford English Dictionary , 1st ed. "indemnify, v.1". Oxford University Press (Oxford), 1900.

    Verb

    (en-verb)
  • To secure against loss or damage; to insure.
  • * 1670 , , letter to Lord Arlington, in The Works of Sir William Temple , page 101:
  • The states must at last engage to the merchants here that they will indemnify them from all that shall fall out.
  • (senseid)(chiefly, legal) To compensate or reimburse someone for some expense or injury
  • * 1906 , Civil Code of the State of California [http://books.google.com/books?id=Vds3AAAAIAAJ], page 405:
  • The lender of a thing for use must indemnify the borrower for damage caused by defects or vices in it, which he knew at the time of lending, and concealed from the borrower.
    Derived terms
    * indemnifiable * indemnification * indemnifier

    Etymology 2

    From , assimilated to (indemn) and

    Verb

  • (obsolete, rare) to hurt, to harm
  • *1583 , Thomas Stocker's translation of A tragicall historie of the troubles and ciuile warres of the lowe Countries , i. 63a
  • *:He... did not belieue]] that his [[Majesty, Maiestie by this occasion coulde any way be endemnified .
  • *1593 , Thomas Lodge, Life & Death of William Long Beard , E ij
  • *:What harme the Rhodians haue]] [[done, doone thee, that thou so much indemnifiest them?
  • References