No matter the size of your company, it’s always recommended to protect yourself, your employees and assets with business insurance. Helping you to safeguard yourself against unforeseen legal costs, stock or premises damage and more.
When running a company, you never know what’s around the corner. This is why protecting yourself and your assets with tailored insurance is a must. Business or commercial insurance policies can come with different levels of covers, including:
In this helpful guide, we will cover a range of topics, including:
- What is business insurance?
- What is covered in commercial insurance?
- Is business insurance a legal requirement?
What Is Business Insurance?
No matter if you’re a small, medium or large enterprise, business insurance protection, otherwise known as commercial insurance, can help to cover and protect your company against loss. Helping to safeguard your livelihood against compensation claims, legal costs and more.
Depending on the type of business coverage you purchase and how detailed your coverage is, you can also be protected against business interruption, supply chain breakdown and more
What Is Covered In Commercial Insurance?
There are various types of commercial insurance. At The Levels Financial, we know that not all businesses operate the same, therefore not all companies will need the same coverage and protection from their insurance.
This is why we will always work alongside you to discover how you run your corporation and what level of cover would best benefit you. When running a successful business, there are many things owners may need to protect themselves and their assets from, including (but not limited to) contractors’ liability insurance product insurance, business renters insurance and more.
At The Levels Financial, we can work with you to find the right insurance, policies and more that will work best for you. Below we will outline the most popular insurance policies for businesses.
Key Person Cover
A ‘key person’ is any employee who directly impacts the business’s profits. This could be an owner, director, partner or employee with a specialist skill. Key person cover is a life insurance policy taken out by the business on behalf of a key person, including critical illness cover.
Unlike domestic life insurance, if a key person were to fall ill or pass away whilst working for a limited company, the policy payout is paid to the company or the partners.
What are the benefits of key person cover?
- Protects profits – any loss that may be triggered by the key person being unable to work will be covered
- Protect against loss of profits during business disruption
- Paying back any debt or overdraft payments that occurred due to the key person being unable to work
- Helps to cover salaries, dividends, or loaned money through a director’s loan account
If you want to find out more about life insurance policies, key person cover or critical illness cover, contact a member of our advisory team and they will be able to help.
For more information, see our blog posts about domestic life insurance and critical illness coverage:
Shareholder Protection Insurance
Does your private limited company have multiple shareholders or partners? If they were to die, would you be able to afford their share? Shareholder protection insurance is a policy that can help protect the ownership in these types of situations.
Shareholder protection insurance enables the surviving shareholders or owner(s) to purchase the deceased shares. While also ensuring that the deceased dependants have cash, and a willing buyer instead of inheriting a business share.
How does it work?
If a shareholder was to be given a life expectancy of less than 12 months, shareholder protection insurance can be used to help purchase the deceased person’s share.
General Liability Insurance
General liability insurance, otherwise known as commercial or business liability insurance, covers various claims which could impact small to medium firms, such as:
- Injuries
- Property damage
- Personal or advertising injury
- Medical payments
- Products-completed operations
- Damages to rented premises
Employment Practices Liability Insurance (EPLI)
Most small to large enterprises that employ people would benefit from taking out employment practices liability insurance (EPLI). This helps to protect themselves if an employee files a claim against you for various issues, such as:
- Wrongful discipline
- Wrongful termination
- Sexual harassment
- Discrimination
- Negligent evaluation
- Breach of employment contract
- Mismanagement of employee benefits
- Wrongful infliction of emotional distress
If you make a claim, the policy will protect your business and help with any payouts, legal fees or more that are necessary (depending on your circumstances and the coverage).
Is Business Insurance A Legal Requirement?
Business insurance is a broad term to cover a wide range of insurance types and policies; these can be purchased to help protect your livelihood and that of your employees. While the majority of the insurance types aren’t a legal requirement, employers’ liability insurance (ELI or EL), is a legal requirement.
ELI covers your business if one of your staff members claims they’ve suffered illness or injury as a result of working for you. EL insurance will cover your legal and compensation costs involved in defending the case. If you don’t have employer liability insurance, you could be fined £2500 per day if you’re unprotected by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
Receive Commercial Protection Insurance From The Levels Financial
Unsure if your business is currently protected? Want to look into the different ranges of protection that could benefit you?
We will work with you to get to know you and your business so that we can best advise you on what policies would suit your company set-up best. For more information get in touch with our team of award-winning insurance advisors today and book your free initial consultation at admin@thelevelsfinancial.co.uk or call us at 01458 772 040.
Please Note:
If you stop paying premiums your coverage could cease.
If you cancel your plan you will not receive any money back
We offer products from a choice of insurers
