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Archive for April, 2010

Cheap business insurance – get a package

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

Everyone knows that if you look for something that is cheap, then you are more than likely to get something of a lesser quality.

But, if you are prepared to accept something that is slightly cheaper (ie not the absolute rock bottom price) then you may get a a product or a service which is not of such a lower quality.

When looking for cheap business insurance, you do need to be careful. It is not the same as buying a cheap tv, where the £50 difference in price may only mean that the cheaper one needs replacing 6 months earlier or the remote control does not have quite so many functions.

For example, you may be looking for cheap restaurant insurance, your policy may, if you get one too cheap, not provide you with all the cover you require. When you are talking potentially £50,000 worth of trade contents which may not be insured correctly, or at all, then you do need to thinks very carefully about the quality of the policy.

One way to save money, is to buy a “package” policy. Most UK commercial insurance companies prefer to insure certain types of industry. For the ones they want to insure more of, they will spend time and money designing and creating a specialist insurance package that includes purely the covers needed for that trade. For your restaurant or takeaway this will be the best way to get the cheapest price, whilst not forgetting that you do need some decent cover at the some time.

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Online business insurance quotes – the middle ground

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

If, like me, you are old enough to remember business life in the 1980’s, you will now that if you were looking for a commercial insurance quote, you did not have many options.

Your choices were, similar to Henry Ford in the early days, limited to speaking to brokers. Insurers were not keen to deal directly with members of the public as far as business insurance was concerned. They wanted a broker to do the fact finding from you and then to put the information in the correct style and format in order for them to provide a quote.

We have now gone full circle and you have the option of going to a broker or intermediary, who will then speak to an insurer and the second option is to go direct. The real revolution is how you interact with these companies.

Not only can you see someone face to face or speak on the phone, you can get an online business insurance quote at 3 am if you wish.

We want you to use the internet, it is the easiest way to find a broker that does what you want. But, we also want to offer you the middle ground between a time consuming face to face meeting and receiving an online quote that you do not understand or have the time to read through.

That middle ground is to call and discuss your business insurance with someone like us. We don’t use scripts and you don’t have to fill in boxes on the internet, we are not a machine, just human beings sitting at the end of a phone line waiting to get you exactly what you want, a competitive quote which provides you with wide cover.

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Business insurance – plain English policies

Monday, April 19th, 2010

In 2010 people can, quote rightly, demand that and type of contract they enter into is in plain English and easy to understand. Business insurance, is thought by many to be a staid, almost boring industry. But, when you consider the lengths that the industry has gone to in cleaning up it’s act on “small print” that neither man nor beast could understand, then it can be considered quite progressive.

I can remember insurance contracts, even as close as the early to mid nineties, being very complex, unwieldy and difficult to understand, and this is coming from people that were actually paid to work in the industry! A sea change occurred with the plain English campaign and it became almost a race to make sure that policy wordings were reviewed and assessed with a more modern eye.

The key point was that the wordings could not be “dumbed down”. If there was a potential legal action based on the policy wording terminology, then it still had to be able to stand up to the scrutiny of the legal profession.

It may seem simple to read through a lengthy contract and put this into terms that are much easier to understand, but it really is a skill to do this without:-

a) making the wording excessively long when compared to the original and

b) so that the essence of what the policy was trying to say and do, was not lost.

I am currently tasked with re-negotiating our business premises lease as we are moving, in the same building, from the first, to the second floor. The most confusing thing I have come across is the “heads of terms” regarding the lease. Even in the current climate, we are still faced with legal documents that contain no punctuation (which is deliberate) and extremely old fashioned terminology. Whilst I had hoped we would not have to, I am going to have to appoint solicitors to review this formally which will no doubt cost 3 or even 4 figures, when the document is only a page and a half long.

Compared to this, your standaed commercial insurance policy wording is a breath of fresh air and long may it continue.

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Commercial building insurance – index linked sum insured?

Saturday, April 17th, 2010

Most commercial insurance policies that cover business buildings will have some form of index-linking built in at renewal. What this means is that each year a certain percentage is applied to your sum insured to increase this to ensure that, over time, inflation does not erode the suitability of the sum insured.

With commercial property insurance you, the policyholder, must ensure that the amount that the building is insured for is adequate. For example, if a building costs £500,000 to purchase, the rebuilding cost could be less or more depending on the age of the building, the construction materials and where it is. In certain parts of the country, even after the recession, up to 40% of the purchase cost of some buildings refers just to the value of the land (with permission for residential/commercial use) it sits on.

If you insure for the incorrect amount (too low) then your claim payments could be reduced, although you do get a 10-20% margin of error with most insurers. If you have had a commercial building insurance policy that fell due for renewal recently, you may have found that the sum insured has not been index-linked. This is a consequence of the price crash over the past 18-24 months. Rebuilding costs always lag behind and insurers have, for a few months, not increased sums insured. This is likely to change very shortly and sums insured will increase again.

What you do need to do is to review your sum insured every year. Forget about the figures on your insurance schedule and work out yourself what the rebuilding cost is likely to be. A really basic rule of thumb for standard construction, post 1900, commercial premises is £100 per square foot. If your sum insured is less than this amount, you should speak to your broker to get this changed. The caveat is, that this is no more than a guide and you should always consult a professional surveyor or valuer if you want to ascertain the correct rebuilding cost.

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Public liability insurance – what is a reasonable excess?

Saturday, April 17th, 2010

We first of all need to look at what an excess is. If you take out public liability insurance, or any other type of insurance cover, you will receive a policy wording and a schedule of insurance.

This can either be in hard copy format or it will be sent to you electronically. Legally, in the UK, you must receive these two documents within 30 days of your insurance cover starting. Or, such confirmation of insurance cover to satisfy you that the insurance protection is in place.

Within your policy wording there will be many terms, conditions, warranties, exclusions and excesses. An excess is basically the amount that you will pay, or contribute towards any claim. Some insurance covers, such as employers liability, do not normally have excesses (unless you go to a real “fringe” insurer, which is usually not recommended).

The purpose of an excess is simply to save the insurers money by not dealing with and/or paying out on small value claims. If you are a carpenter and have public liability insurance, your insurers do not want to pay out because you dropped a hammer and caused £5 worth of damage to a tiled floor.

So, insurers apply different levels of excess to try and prevent you from putting in low value claims. It is very, very important though that you do declare such losses to an insurer. As a worst case scenario, if you as a sole trader have had to pay out of your own pocket for 25 damage claims, all around £50-£100 in the last year, then the insurer has to know because this is worse than careless and only a matter of time before a major claim comes along.

A sensible excess for a trades policy (ie plumbing, building, bricklaying etc) is anything between £100 and £250. Most commercial insurance companies have a standard excess of £100, which can increase to £250 or even £500 if you use heat (ie blowtorches, blow lamps).

Any more than this, then it is time for you to look elsewhere as you really would expect your insurance to kick in for any damage claims over £250.

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Fish and chip shop insurance

Friday, April 16th, 2010

Anyone want to take a guess on what day of the week we do not receive any enquiries for fish and chip shop insurance? Today being Friday is a big clue. It is the same with most types of takeaway insurance, as the week rolls on, the businesses become busier and busier and as Friday arrives, the last thing they want to do is to spend time on administrative duties.

So, what can we do for takeaways and chippies to make their job easier? We have many years of experience in doing the donkey work for you and if you are looking to compare business insurance, whatever you do, then you need to give us a call.

If you think across most aspects of business life, there are intermediaries or third parties who can help you access the services and products you want. Insurance is no different, You have the choice of going direct (= no choice and no independent advice) or going to a broker (= lots of choice and independent advice).

The good thing for the chip shop owner is, when they receive their annual renewal, all they need to do is give us a quick call, any day of the week is fine(!) and we will do the rest for you.

Our job is to look around for alternatives, we are legally obliged to get you a good deal. If you go direct, you only get one product from one insurer, what is the point of that? Go to a broker and at least you know you are getting a few options.

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Cafe insurance – cover for external seating

Thursday, April 15th, 2010

Forget the General Election, what is more important is that summer is, at last, here. Sure, we will have a few blips over the next few weeks but given the winter we have had, whether you are in Scotland, England or Wales, mainland UK could do with a bit of heating up.

As you walk through the high streets of the land you will see that more and more establishments are going through the process of serving food and drink to customers outside of their premises. By outside, we mean external seating to the business premises.

You will need to notify your local authority of this as, in most parts of the country, they will need to approve this and in many cases give you a licence. Of course this is bureaucratic, this is what the UK does best. But, there is a reason for this. If someone is walking along and injures themselves by bumping into a table, then this will potentially be a public liability insurance claim.

The local authority, who have legal responsibility for the pavement, will not pay out because they were not responsible for putting the table/chair etc there. So, this will need to fall upon your cafe insurance policy. Nearly all policies will only provide liability for the risk address or demised premises, so you need to advise them, and get them to agree, to extend the public liability to cover seats and chairs on the pavement.

The good news is, if you deal through a good, quality independent business insurance broker they will not charge you for this, unless you need to increase your limit of indemnity, from say £2,000,000 to £5,000,000.

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Contractors public liability insurance – is this required?

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

Here in the UK, we do have an entrepreneurial spirit. We may have suffered a few years of big government where public sector jobs are ten a penny, but many people want to work on their own and for this reason, they become sole traders, partnerships or even limited companies.

Whilst working for yourself gives you that freedom to be your own boss, there are of course additional responsibilities. The main one is to make sure that your tax affairs are fully in order, the last thing you want to do is have the tax man chasing you for back payments.

Another responsibility that should be high on the list is your business or commercial insurance. We are talking here about contractors (ie plumbers, builders, carpenters etc) and the main cover you should have is public liability insurance. Notice that I said, cover you should have. There is no legal requirement to have this cover in the same way as employers liability insurance is legally required (if you have employees).

However, more and more contractors are finding out that where they contract to someone else, as part of this agreement, they must have valid insurance cover in force. You will find that you need to prove this is in force, by actually showing, emailing or faxing a certificate of insurance.

If you do not show the certificate, then you will not get paid. So, to answer the question, is this required. Then the answer is actually yes in the vast majority of cases.

The good news is that you can either get straight public liability in isolation (no other covers) or you can have this as part of a commercial liability insurance policy and, it is easy peasy to get a quote. If you are reading this on the net, open up another browser window, select UK, search for public liability insurance and phone the first three organic listings you see.

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Shop insurance – best of three

Tuesday, April 13th, 2010

Choice is a wonderful thing. We may not realise it, but in the business world today you can, if you have the time or the inclination, spend as much time as you want looking around for anything you purchase to see if you can get this cheaper.

In 2010, as an independent business insurance broker, we are finding that now, more than ever, people are looking around and trying to reduce their annual insurance expenditure by as much as possible.

There is a warning though, you really do have to be careful though that by driving the cost down more and more, something has got to give. When we are talking protection for your business, in the form of an insurance policy, you need to be fully aware of the small print. This is where, if at all, you will realise that saving that extra £20 has really cost you thousands of pounds.

Retailers are suffering as well as every other type of business. Rightly so, they are looking around to get the best deal on everything. When your annual shop insurance premium is in excess of £6-700 then you can, if you are smart enough save some money.

S0, how do you prove that you are smart enough? By speaking to an insurance broker and asking them to get you alternative quotes. Be as harsh and abrupt with them as possible, demand that they give you three written quotes so you can pick and choose. But, ask them which of the three they would recommend and why.

This way, you have as much information as you are ever going to get. Then, set aside half an hour to read through ALL the correspondence to familiarise yourself with the different policies and decide which to go for.

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Surgery insurance package policies

Monday, April 12th, 2010

Many UK commercial insurance companies base all of their different types of policies on a standard package. The standard package is the skeleton, it contains certain sections which most companies and businesses will need to have. These include business assets and laibilities such as employers and public liability insurance.

If you are looking for a vets surgery insurance (or doctors or dentists) you will find, in most cases, that the skeleton policy used is an office insurance one. The reason being that although the businesses are very different, there are still a lot of similarities in the cover that they provide.

What you do need to look out for is that although your cover may be based on an office policy, you may need to have some additional covers, this is the meat on the bones. So, what differences would an office have to a surgery? A surgery will need to have cover sections to include, for example previous metals (for a dentist) and chilled or referigerated cover for medicines or serums (if you are a doctors surgery).

A vets package will also need to ensure that full public liability is provided, in the event of an animal injuring a third party who is not an employee. Whilst a member of the public may bring an injured animal into the surgery, there is always the potential that this animal could attack other people attending the clinic, this will, more than likely, fall under the liability cover of the surgery.

What you need to do, in all cases, is to speak to a professional, independent business insurance broker. They will listen to you, advise you and best of all search all insurers for the best terms available, they have a legal obligation to do this.

Posted in public liability insurance, vets surgery insurance | No Comments »