Do you need public liability insurance?
There are many different insurance products available, and it can be confusing to decide which are right for you. But once you realise that each type of insurance is simply designed to cover you against different sets of circumstances that may affect certain groups of people, understanding what sort of insurance you need gets a lot easier.
Public liability insurance is designed to protect members of the public, and their property, from accidents that either you cause, or which occur on your territory. The question is, do you need public liability insurance? You might.
What is Public Liability Insurance?
To better understand what public liability insurance is, and what it covers, let’s take a look at some of the circumstances in which it would come in handy:
- A customer, or a delivery person, slips on a rug or trips on a wire while visiting your business premises. They land awkwardly, and their injuries put them out of work for a while.
- You’re showing a client a new website you’ve been building for them. While demonstrating a feature you’re particularly proud of, you accidentally spill coffee on the client’s laptop. The laptop’s ruined, and the client loses a lot of data.
- While carrying out some contractor work at a customer’s house, you accidentally spill some paint on their kitchen floor. It’s not going to be cheap or easy to clean.
- You’re visiting a client’s premises, to learn more about a new product they’re launching. While inspecting the product prototype, your fingers slip and it falls to the floor, shattering into a thousand pieces. A lot of work went into building that prototype, so you’ve just set their project back significantly.
Public liability insurance is designed to protect you if a customer, a client, or a member of the public either injures themselves or damages one of their possessions while they’re on your premises. It will also cover you if you cause any damage or injuries while spending time on their premises. And, as the above examples illustrate, public liability insurance can cover a diverse range of professionals for a diverse range of circumstances.
What does public liability insurance cover?
In each of the above examples, the client, customer or member of the public has suffered some sort of loss. To recover this loss, they may choose to sue you. Public liability insurance will cover your legal costs, and any financial compensation you may have to provide.
Do I Need Public Liability Insurance?
Public liability insurance is not compulsory under UK law. But it’s still absolutely something you should consider.
Some business owners know they need public liability insurance. For instance, if you run a shop, or any other type of business that’s regularly visited by members of the public, then public liability insurance is essential. Similarly, if clients regularly visit your premises, whether it’s for meetings, training, consultations or something else, then public liability insurance could save your skin. Accidents can and do happen. And when they happen on your turf, you might be held responsible.
If you’re a contractor or a freelancer, you might not feel that public liability insurance is for you. But if you ever spend any time on a client’s property, public liability insurance could provide essential peace of mind that you’ll be covered in the events of any accidents.
Consider the examples we provided above: If you’re a freelancer, something as simple as spilling a cup of coffee while chatting to a client could cause no end of damage. And if you’re a contractor, depending on your line of work, all sorts of accidents could happen while you’re working on a client’s premises.
Some accidents seem unthinkable until they happen. Public liability insurance is the sort of insurance you may not know you need until you need it. Certain clients may even stipulate that you need it before they’ll agree to work with you.
So do you need public liability insurance? All things considered, you probably do.
How Much Public Liability Insurance Do I Need?
A comprehensive public liability insurance policy might be surplus to requirements if you only occasionally visit clients, or if clients or members of the public rarely visit you. Most public liability insurance policies are likely too pricey or impractical for the majority of freelancers and contractors.
But as we’ve established, freelancers and contractors may need public liability insurance as much as any business owner. For this reason we decided to design flexible policies that you can adjust according to your needs.
With our public liability cover, you can increase and decrease the level you need depending on the contracts you have and your client’s stipulations. If you have a big project coming up that you know will require you to spend a lot of time on your client’s turf, or if a new client insists that you get a more comprehensive level of cover, all you have to do is let us know. You’ll always get exactly the cover you need, and you’ll never pay more than you need.
We offer public liability insurance as a flexible and affordable add-on to our freelance and contractor insurance policies. Head here for more information, and a free quote.
If you need help and support in getting your insurance please contact us at info@tapoly.com