Umbrella company FAQs – do I need my own insurance?
The short answer is no! All Liquid Friday umbrella employees are automatically covered by our essential business insurances.
Most of us have various types of insurance policy for our homes, cars, pets and for when we travel. In all these aspects of our everyday lives we hope for the best, but insure for the worst. The same goes for business insurance.
As a contractor it makes good sense to mitigate risk by having appropriate professional insurances in place, and with Liquid Friday you are properly covered.
Apart from giving you peace of mind, when it comes to finding work this gives you the edge over contractors who may not have equivalent levels of cover. Indeed many contracts require that insurances are in place as a condition of acceptance.
Types of insurance cover
Here’s an overview of the different types of policy, and instances when they might come into play:
Public Liability
Public Liability insurance covers against the risk of accidents or incidents which affect third parties, resulting in them making a claim.
Examples include damage to property, injury to third party persons and legal costs. Even very minor incidents can result in massive third party claims, enough to put you out of business several times over, so it is worth considering this type of policy carefully. Aside from that, most clients will insist on having Public Liability cover in place before you start work, in which case it isn’t really optional.
Professional Indemnity
Essentially Professional Indemnity (PI) insurance is to cover you against possible claims of negligence. If you make an error in the performance of your duties or otherwise cause your client financial losses, they may put in a claim against you.
PI covers any damages you have to pay out as a result of such a claim and also your legal costs. Aside from negligence, bear in mind that this type of insurance covers loss of data or documents, intellectual property breaches and cases of libel or defamation.
When you take on a job or project there will often be a contractual obligation for a certain level of Professional Indemnity cover.
Employers Liability
Employers Liability insurance provides cover for liability for any injury or illness as a result of your work with us. It is a legal requirement for any business that has employees. Often contracts use standard wording which make this type of insurance cover obligatory.
Personal Accident
This covers you for inability to work as a result of an accident at work or while driving. Everyone thinks “it won’t happen to me”, but if the worst happened, how would you and your family manage financially?
Good to go
We always provide copies of our insurances to agencies and clients before we start working with them, so everything will be already in place before your assignment starts.
If you would like any further information on the policies you are covered by, contact the Liquid Friday team for further information.