Everyone knows the phrase that a picture paints a thousand words, but how on earth can we relate this to business insurance? Here at businessinsure, we do not pay to advertise. We never have done and hopefully never will. Evreyone that speaks to us does so because they want us to provide them with advice or some form of insurance quote, cover or amendment. With the internet being our primary source, when seeking services from others, we have designed our business solely around this proposition. We have built a website that we believe offers help and advice to the vast majority of small (sub £5,000,000 turnover) to medium companies that will ever have a need for insurance. This website is updated weekly and we have these regular blogs to provide snippets of information to hopefully help people in deciding where to go for a business or property insurance quote.

But, we are not a multi-national, we have helped over 20,000 businesses and individuals over the years, but we do cannot compete with the bigger insurance comparison websites. They have huge marketing budgets and as a result of their huge investment in advertising, pay per click, search engine optimisation and other unknown activities, they get to the Holy Grail, the top of Google UK.

However, just this morning I thought I would check to see where we were appearing on Google, if you do not do this at least once a week then you tend to miss what is trending. My Chrome browser is set to deliver the top ten search results, I do not use Google instant because I have grown up without it and I think the jury is still out on whether this is a good thing or not. Anyway, the main search phrase that people will use is business insurance, of course. This morning, forgetting the paid for results at the top and the side, the top ten results were all different, as you would expect. Of the top ten, 8 were for websites that offered a form of online comparison engine (ie no human interaction), one of them was to businesslink which does not offer independent advice, but instead points you to another website for the British Insurance Brokers Association. We have deliberately chose not to be part of this so do not appear on this site.

Going back then, there are ten results. 8 are for comparison sites or sites with an online quote tool, one is a government sponsored site and the last is us. We are the only entry in the top ten where you can pick up the phone about anything from shop to office to pub insurance and speak to an independent broker and get some independent advice from, wait for it, a human being. This may not be much to some people, but we believe it is a great thing to speak to someone. Going back to a picture painting a thousand words, we find that a five minute phone call can make a huge difference to making someone fill in pages and pages of a website.

If your business does not fit into one of their chosen categories, your snookered. Speak to us and we can work out what product you need, what we can offer you and if not, where else we can send you. All of this in a short phone call. The frustrating thing is that, we are never going to sit at the top of the tree, even though we give people what they need and want.

Anyone who has individual shares, or a plan with holdings, in any of the UK financial institutions will probably not want to be reminded of the last 6 months. The back end of 2010 and early 2011 saw a slow but steady rise in the share price. But, with the Eurozone and elsewhere in the world still nowhere out of the financial woods yet, shares have taken a hammering.

But does the overall share price of some of these companies have any effect on your business insurance premium, for example. In a word, in capital letters, that are in bold and flashing lights, the answer is NO. We have been trading now since the year 2000. We have seen the tail end of the dot.com boom, the panic in the financial markets following 9/11 and, here in the UK, the financial bubble that the Labour party inflated and inflated from 2002 to 2007. After this fell apart we saw shares in some of the bigger UK insurers plummet and whilst they recovered during 2008, 9 and 10, many are not far off their early to mid 2008 figures.

The good thing is that these companies are so large and many so diverse, that the stock markets valuation (in its loosest possible sense) of their company has no effect whatsoever on the premiums they charge. And there is logic to his. The great Warren Buffet bought an insurance company because it had such a substantial “float” in the form of premium. If a companies share price is hit, and they try and increase this float too much, through increased premiums, one of two things will happen.

If there are competitors doing the same thing, then thay can follow the same wave as the market (in terms of premium income) increases. If however they are doing this on their own, then what tends to happen is that the compeititon cherry pick the best, at good premiums, and the company that are trying to increase only get to keep the dross.

All types of covers, such as pub insurance, are subject to fluctuating premiums throughout any year, but an increase of more than 5% is not going to be stomached by many punters in the real world.

After a relative lull in new business insurance enquiries for pubs and licensed trade businesses, we are slowly starting to see an increase in 2011. I do not think we are ever going to get back to the same activity levels as 2007 when the UK banks seemed to be throwing money at new business, leisure related, ventures.  Unfortunately for many, the banks were foolish in what they did and businesses were saddled with more debt than they should have had. We all know the rest of the story, but thankfully we can last see a glint of light at the end of the tunnel.

With the new enquiries we are getting through, we are tending to see a small change, we do not necessarily get a distinct pub insurance quote enquiry. Many of these businesses are not just pubs, but maybe have letting rooms and/or a restaurant.

As far as the insurance rating is concerned, for identical sums insured there would be a small difference for each of the trades. This of course depends on which insurer you go to, but the question is how do you get the best quote? If you use one of the online providers, you will find it very difficult to pick a mixed use category. Do not be tempted to pick pub or hotel or restaurant or takeaway. What you do not want to do is take the wrong option and be faced with a claim that is turned down because the insurers say that you forgot to tell them that you were a restaurant with takeaway.

Firstly, you need to get a rough idea of how much of your turnover relates to which particular activity. For example, if you are a pub, with letting rooms, and you earn 60% of your turnover from the pub, then you will do this on a pub policy.

Secondly, you need to speak to an independent broker and let them look around the market for you to get the best possible price, for your exact business description, with the widest possible cover.

Unlike most physical products, pub insurance policies are not available at set prices. Here at Businessinsure, we do not go in for the marketing that says we will guarantee to beat your existing premium. Usually, these deals are so tight anyway and if you have had claims or there are other “out of the ordinary” factors, the guarantee does not apply. We have also heard of one guarantee that beat the premium a customer had, but tripled the excess. Not quite such a good deal!

What we can do, is to promise you that we will always do our level best to find you the best priced quote and the widest cover. When looking for business insurance, it is a bit of a balancing act. We have to discuss with you what your demands and needs are, and to offer you the best product from our panel of suppliers.

If we offer you a dirt cheap quote, then it is likely that someone within that quote you may find that the cover is not quite as good as you used to have. What we can do, and this happens in 95% of enquiries, is to offer you a better premium, usually around 10% less, for the same or better cover.

You have a choice, you can spend days and days searching and yes, you will find a cheaper quote. But the opposite side of this choice is, if you take the cheaper quote then you will probably end up paying in the long run.

Whilst we have headed this December pub insurance deals, we will always do our best, whether it is now or in future months. Give us a call and see what we can do for you.