May « 2010 « BusinessInsure Blog

Archive for May, 2010

Salon insurance – shutters can make the difference

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

Most salon insurance policies are very similar. As with most commercial insurance policies, the options available include a standard range of package covers. These include, commercial building insurance, contents, stock, liabilities, money and business interruption.

In addition, if you are leasing your salon (or hairdressers or barbers) then you will also find that under the terms of your lease agreement with the property owner, then you will be responsible for the shop front glass. Some commercial leases, will request that you cover the frames and fitments as well. Whilst this may not seem a lot, a smashed window which requires a full frame and door replacement can easily cost a few thousand pounds.

You do therefore need to ensure that your business insurance broker provides you with the correct policy cover that includes shop front glass. Certain insurers, few and far between though, do offer unlimited glass cover. In the main the remainder ask for sum insured to be declared. You may need to speak to a glazier to get a replacement quote for all of your glass, but you would normally be looking at a sum insured of at least £2,000 for a normal shop front. You have to think as well about any emergency boarding up costs if your windows are smashed through the night. Most police authorities have the authority to appoint an approved emergency glazier without the need to contact you.

As glass claims are one of the more common ones under salon, pub and shop insurance, if you have roller shutters (external) you may be able to get an additional discount on your annual insurance premium. This does raise one further question though, that is that you need to ensure that you have insurance cover for loss or damage to your roller shutters as well.

Posted in salon insurance | No Comments »

Takeaway insurance – what type of deep fat frying do you do?

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

It may seem strange to anyone that owns a takeaway, but commercial insurance companies, that provide cover, do have different ways of defining deep fat frying.

Depending on the type of deep fat frying that you do, can determine the type of takeaway insurance quote that you actually receive. What the insurers are looking for is the scale of frying that you undertake. Even in these more health conscious times, you can still walk up and down most high streets in the land and find numerous different types of takeaway.

If you have a table top or basket fryer, that simply plugs in to the wall and has it’s own internal thermostatic control, then this is rated, or priced, differently to those businesses that have fryers that are at floor level or are fixed.

You always need to declare the type of cooking that you do, whether this is oven, microwave, toaster or frying. You will usually find that the premium differential, for a table top fryer, can be up to 40%. This businesses that have hu built in frying ranges are more likely to suffer fire losses and also employers liability claims for slips, trips and falls given the amount of cooking fat that is in use.

If you have a policy in place that is shortly due for renewal, make sure that your broker is fully aware of the cooking that you do. It could be that they are charging you far too much for the risks that you actually present.

Posted in takeaway insurance quote | No Comments »

Business insurance – forcible and violent theft and what it means to your cover.

Monday, May 17th, 2010

Business insurance policies are created, for want of a better word, in the same way as a house or car insurance. You have certain sections or types of cover which are all packaged up together in one policy.

Think about your car insurance and although you buy one policy, within it you have cover for the vehicle, your third party liabilities, windscreen, personal effects and legal expenses (if you have one of the better policies).

The same can be said of your commercial insurance cover. You can have business buildings insurance, stock, liabilities and other covers.

For your stock, you will then have defined causes of loss covered, such as theft, storm, flood, fire etc. Theft claims are unfortunately increasing as the country continues to emerge from it’s recent economic problems. As the country, and it’s people suffer, the level of theft claims does increase.

You need to read through your policy wording, or if you are just at the stage of getting a business insurance quote, you need to read through the quote and the summary of cover that is also provided.

Within the cover, you will find that you only have theft cover if you can prove that someone has broken in, or broken out of the premises. This does not apply to hotel or office insurance.

For all other types of policy though, you need to ensure that every single time the business is left unoccupied or unattended (including during business hours) that all security measures that exist, are put in to full effect.

Posted in office insurance quote | No Comments »

Shop insurance – wedding dresses and alteration cover

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

Look around any high street in the country and you will find that there is a wedding dress shop. Gone are the days when you were so restricted and had to travel miles for your dress fitting.

If you are the owner of one of these business then you will have shop insurance in place to cover your stock, contents and liabilities. Many of these shops are basic retail only, with the manufacture and alteration being undertaken by third parties or the dress suppliers.

However, more and more of these business are now realising that not only should you do the dress, clothing and accessory retail but you should also do the alterations on site.

If you do this then it is something that you need to notify to your commercial insurance company because there are increased risks. The two main risks that are increased are public liability and employers liability.

Public liability is increased if for example during the alteration process you manage to injure the potential bride. You may think this is unlikely, but in our increasing litigious country, anything is possible.

The main increased liability risk is to your employees. There is much more chance of an injury to someone using a sewing machine, scissor and other alteration equipment than someone who is undertaking a purely retail role. Again, we are not saying it is a huge risk, but as ever the potential in there.

You need to ensure that your policy specifically notes that you undertake alterations directly, otherwise they could turn around and decline the claim.

Posted in employers liability insurance, shop insurance | No Comments »

Pub and bar insurance – licensed doormen

Friday, May 14th, 2010

Within a pub insurance policy, you will have a range of covers available, one of these covers is public liability insurance.

This will cover you for any claims made against you, as a sole trader, as a partnership or a limited company, for injury, illness, disease or damage to third party persons or property.

It does not matter if someone is inebriated and for example they trip over and injure themselves. If they can prove that you have been negligent, then you will have a valid claim against your insurance policy. With the increase in now win no fee solicitors, these types of claims are all to common.

Now imagine the situation, on a Friday night at chucking out time, you have a particular unruly customer who is forcibly ejected. Then three months later you get a letter from a solicitor alleging that you have caused the individual a serious injury.

If you have doormen then you will need to speak to them about what happened. In reality, they will probably say that they do not remember anything about this whatsoever.

This is where you will find it is a much better option for your business to get hold of doormen from a licensed agency as opposed to employing them yourselves. They will be used to this sort of action and their insurers will be able to deal with this directly.

If you do have directly employed doormen or doorstaff, then you will need to make sure that your business insurance policy not only includes public liability but in addition notes specifically that you need cover for the actions of doorstaff. Most pub insurance policies will automatically exclude cover for the actions of doormen.

Speak to your business insurance broker and make sure that they are fully aware of your business and what you do.

Posted in pub insurance | No Comments »

Commercial Building Insurance – Malicious Damage Cover

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

Under a standard commercial building insurance policy, you will be provided with cover for a range of perils. The world peril means an event or cause, for example a fire, storm or flood. The policy will provide, in the event of a valid claim, a financial settlement or reinstatement of any damaged property if the structure of the building has been damaged.

Two of the perils that are usually covered are theft and malicious damage. Under theft cover, if someone breaks in and physically steals something from the tenants (or yourself if you occupy), they will in many cases cause more damage (in cost terms) going into or out of the building than the actual cost of the theft. It is therefore vital that you have this cover but also to make sure that not only theft, but attempted theft is covered. Again, people attempting to break in (ie through an expensive roller shutter) can cause a lot of damage.

In addition to the standard theft cover, you will also get cover for malicious damage. There is a fine line between malicious damage and attempted theft. For example, if a building has a window smashed by a thrown brick, and it is not witnessed, then how do we know if it was someone attempting to break in or just a malicious act.

The law defines what is theft, under the theft act 1968 and all it’s subsequent revisions. If you cannot prove it is theft (which some insurers may ask you to do) then it needs to fall under malicious damage.

When you are locking for a commercial property insurance quote, you will find that both these perils (theft and malicious damage) are covered as they go hand in hand. It is important to make sure though that they are covered with a normal or nominal excess.

Posted in commercial property insurance quote | No Comments »

Compare business insurance – now is the time!

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Anyone who is in business, will by now, half way through 2010, have realised that there are changes afoot in the premiums being charged for commercial insurance.

For the past 7 or 8 years, we have seen a steady decrease in premiums being charged for good quality insurance business. When we say good quality, from an insurers point of view, this simply means a risk with a good claims history. It could be a pub, shop, property owners, manufacturer – anything – as long as the history was good, insurers would give you the premiums you wanted.

However, if your insurance was due for renewal in the past few months, you will have found that your premium had increased, only by a few percent probably, but a positive increase nonetheless.

If this is happening to you, then now is the time for you to set aside a morning or afternoon and go through the process to compare business insurance with at least two other providers. If you do, this will result in two things. Firstly, and probably most likely, you will find that there are better prices available. And secondly, if you do not find a better price, then at least you can rest assured that your current provider is charging you the market rate.

Posted in compare business insurance | No Comments »

Pub insurance – should I insure the brewery stock?

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

A standard pub insurance policy, available from most UK insurers, will offer a range of covers that are suitable, or most likely to be used or needed, by a public house.

You will have the option of picking and choosing many of the covers, although a certain “core” list of covers must be taken out, these include public liability insurance and business contents insurance cover. The optional covers will be for commercial building insurance, goods in transit and employers liability with others available.

Where you are a landlord, effectively renting or leasing a building from a brewery, you will receive stock on what is more or less a sale or return basis. Technically, you do not own the stock as the brewery could turn up and re-claim this at any point.

But, as the stock is in your care, custody or control you are responsible, at law and through the terms of the lease. So, the answer to the question is yes, you do need to insure the brewery stock. The good news is that a pub insurance policy can include cover for your stock either of food, wines and spirits or other stocks.

You need to work out what the maximum stock holding is likely to be and to make sure that your policy covers this. Some of the better policies will have an automatic seasonal increase of 15 or 25%. This means that in the week preceding and following any Bank Holiday your stock sum insured is increased, free of charge, as these are the likely periods when you will have more stock on the premises. This is to prevent you having to notify your broker every time your stock sum insured goes above the policy limit.

Posted in commercial building insurance, pub insurance | No Comments »

Exhibition insurance cover – a separate policy is not always required

Monday, May 10th, 2010

Many businesses will attend trade shows, exhibitions or conferences during the course of the year. In 2010, most of the bigger exhibition centres will insist on exhibitors having a minimum level of public liability insurance. This can vary from £2,000,000 (the usual minimum) up to £5,000,000.

You need to read through the terms and conditions very carefully because, you may find that as part of your attendance or exhibitor costs, they have automatically included a premium for public liability insurance.

This can be as little as £50 or up to £200 and, if you can prove that you have this cover already, they will deduct this from your cost.

If you are due to exhibit or attend a conference, then you need to check whether your current commercial insurance policy does provide you with wider public liability already.

A standard policy will only cover your business activities at the insured risk address. Many policies will include wider public liability for you whilst attending any exhibition, conference or similar location in the UK. You may need to ask your business insurance broker to provide you with a proof of cover letter which you can then send to the exhibition organiser to show that you have alternative cover and do not want their, usually, overpriced option.

Posted in exhibition public liability insurance | No Comments »

Professional Indemnity Insurance

Saturday, May 8th, 2010

With commercial insurance coverage, in the UK, you have a seemingly infinite list of different covers.

One of these is professional indemnity insurance which, although not a legal requirement, is a cover that is being requested more and more by all types and sizes of business.

But what exactly is it? You have to firstly understand what is covered by standard business liability insurance. This includes public, employers and products. Public liability is responsibility for loss, damage or injury to third parties. Products is the same, but only in respect of products supplied. Employers liability insurance, as the name suggests is if any employees are injured as a result of the business activity.

Professional indemnity covers your legal (ie through contract law) responsibility for financial loss suffered by a third party as a result of any advice or service you have provided, whether or not a fee was received. The fundamental point is that for the business liability insurance, there has to be evidence of injury, illness, disease or damage. For PI insurance, there does not have to be evidence of a physical loss, but instead a financial loss.

If you advise a customer to purchase a particular computer system and it does not work out to what they have specified, they could lose out through increased working expenses or lost customers. If they can prove that they acted on your specific advice and their business has suffered financially, purely as a result of your advice, you could find yourselves seriously out of pocket. To prevent this, makes sure that in addition to the standard liability covers, you have a decent professional indemnity policy in force.

Posted in PI insurance, professional indemnity insurance | No Comments »