Plumbers Insurance

This is an important cover for your business.

Imagine what would happen if you or an employee caused injury or damage to a third party or their property.

Your business could face legal action and be liable for any compensation and legal costs.

If you didn't have insurance, could your business afford to cover these costs and continue to trade?

Most businesses could not.

You can buy £1m, £2m or £5m cover from Insuristic.

If you need £10m cover, we can arrange another insurance policy to top up your cover (called an Excess of Loss policy).

Examples of common public liability claims:

• If a fitting is installed incorrectly, causing a leak, damaging a customer's property.

• A customer or member of the public trips over your equipment and hurts themselves.

• Injury or property damage as a result of a product you’ve fitted.

Public liability insurance isn’t compulsory for plumbers, but you should definitely consider buying it.

 It is worth knowing:

• Damaging something you are installing, repairing or maintaining isn’t covered. Your public liability insurance cover would apply to the subsequent damage it causes, such as water damage following a leak.

• Each claim will be subject to an excess, which you can find on your policy schedule.

If you have employees, you must buy Employers Liability Insurance (EL) by law.

The law says you must buy a policy providing at least £5m of cover. 

Insuristic provides £10m as standard. However, if an injury is caused by asbestos or terrorism, the maximum cover will be £5m.

An employee could be:

• Permanent or Temporary; or

• Other people working under your control and direction. Such as apprentices, labour-only sub-contractors or one of your mates helping out.

EL Insurance covers your legal liabilities in the event that an employee is killed or injured whilst at work.

Failing to buy this cover will result in a fine of £2,500 for every day that hasn’t been properly insured.

You can also be fined £1,000 if you do not display your EL certificate or refuse to make it available to inspectors when they ask.

You must disclose at the outset if you are likely to work with temporary employees during the year.

Insuristic can provide cover for 3 temporary employees at a discounted rate.

The cover will be the same as you have chosen for your main employees. For example, if you have included both public and employer liability, temporary employees will be covered at the same level.

Caveats:

• These employees can work for your business for no more than 50 days collectively in a year.

• If they work more than 50 days, you should insure them like a full-time employee.

You can choose to purchase £100,000 of legal costs and expenses, providing cover in the following insured events (for full details of the cover, you should read your policy wording):

• Employment Disputes and Compensation Awards

• Tax Disputes

• Property Disputes: where someone damages your property, causes nuisance or is trespassing. Or you might need to recover or repossess property from a current or ex-employee.

• Legal Defence following a criminal investigation or enquiry

• Compliance and regulatory investigations, disciplinary hearings or notices which you wish to appeal against

• Statutory license appeals

• Loss of Earnings following court, tribunal, arbitration, regulatory proceedings or a professional body’s disciplinary hearing

• Contract Disputes

And more.

Each claim will be subject to an excess which will be shown on your policy schedule.

Insurance Protection if your tools are lost, stolen or accidentally damaged.

• You can cover the tools owned by your business; and

• You can also insure your employee tools.

The cover applies day and night; however, for certain items, you will need to adhere to the minimum security conditions set out in your policy wording.

Each claim will be subject to an excess which will be shown on your policy schedule.

If more than 25% of your turnover comes from Bona Fide Sub-Contractors, you must tell your insurer at the quotation stage (or if this changes during the policy year).

Your insurer will insist that you maintain a record of the insurance of any bona fide sub-contractors that you use.  You will need to keep a record of your Employers Liability Insurance, Public and Products Liability Insurance. 

You will need to check and record that:

1. The insurance provides cover for all the activities they undertake on your behalf before they start working with you.

2. The insurance contains a provision of granting indemnity to any Principal. 

3. The limits of liability are not less than what you have purchased.

4. The cover will be valid and in force for the duration of the contract

If you use heat in your plumbing and heating engineering work, you must confirm this when getting a quotation.  If you fail to do this and you use heat, all claims relating to this work will be excluded.

If the insurer provides cover for heat work, it will usually be restricted to the use of handheld tools like hot air guns, soldering irons, blow torches, and angle grinders.

If you work at height (this includes basic use of ladders) you must select the height limit you work up to when getting a quotation.  The insurer will exclude any claims above the agreed height limit.

If you work below ground level, select the maximum depth you work at when getting a quotation.  The insurer will exclude any claims below the agreed depth limit. 

You will also need to adhere to the underground services condition.  This will include things like: 

1. Checking the location of cables, pipes or other underground services before commencing your work.

2. Keeping a written record of the measures taken to locate any pipes, cables and services.

3. Requiring you to convey the location of any pipes, cables, and services to others working on your behalf.

If you are likely to work at any of the following locations or premises during the policy year, you must tell the insurer at the quote stage. If you are asked to work at any of these locations during the policy year and haven't agreed on the cover with the insurer, you must tell us.

Examples of High-risk locations:

• Refineries, bulk storage or production premises in the oil, gas or chemical industries.

• Power production premises in the electric or hydroelectric industries.

• Offshore structures and work underground or underwater.

• Aircraft, hovercraft, aerospace systems or watercraft (other than at docks, harbours, boatyards or inland waterways not involving the use of heat).

• Railways or airports.

Your insurer will require you to:

• issue PPE to all employees who require them

• Keep a record of the employee

• Ensure the use of PPE by employees is always enforced

You insurance policy will contain a policy condition confirming that you must have an up to date Health and Safety Policy in force that is communicated to and acknowledged by all employees.

Your insurer will require you to ensure all work is inspected on completion by you or someone acting on your behalf. 

This inspection will need to be recorded and contain confirmation that the work has been satisfactorily completed.  The record should include the time, date and name of the person inspecting the work. 

If there is a claim, the insurer will need to see this record.

100% yes. Could you afford to reimburse a large public liability claim out of your own pocket?

If you don't have employees, public liability insurance is the minimum cover you should buy. This will protect you should you accidentally injure someone or damage their property.

If you have employees, you must buy Employers Liability Insurance. This is a legal requirement, and you can be fined £1,000 for each day you don't have it.

There are other covers you should be considering too. These are all explained on this page.

If something changes in your business during the policy year, you must tell us, as failing to do so could mean you don't have the right insurance cover.  Examples include:

• You've taken on more staff.

• Your business has acquired additional tools and equipment, requiring your sums insured to be increased.

• Your business activities have changed.  For example, you arranged the policy while only doing plumbing and heating work.  But now you want to undertake building work like kitchen and bathroom installations.

• You've been asked to work at a high-risk location (which you may not be covered for)

• The height or depth that you are working at is changing

 There will be other examples.  The best thing to do is contact us if anything changes.

Yes and you must ensure you add all of the activities undertaken by your business. Only those listed on your policy schedule will be covered.

For example, if your primary trading is a plumbing and heating engineer but you also install kitchen and bathrooms, you need to add kitchen and bathroom installer as your second trade.

These additional trades can be covered on the same insurance policy. You might find that there are policy conditions not listed on this page that are applied by the insurer for the additional trade.

If the client alleges a leak and subsequent damage were caused by something you repaired or installed, they could make a claim against your public liability insurance. The claim could come from them directly or, as often the case, from their home insurance company, which managed the claim and the repair.

If you are a self-employed plumber, the below may help guide you on the insurance covers you should consider:

• If you have any employees, temporary or permanent, you will need Employers Liability Insurance by law.

• If you don't have employees, there isn't any insurance compulsory by law, but it is recommended you consider:

  • Public Liability Insurance: to provide you with protection if you accidentally injure someone during the course of your work or if you damage someone elses property.

  • Legal Expenses Insurance: providing legal protection against events like tax disputes, contract disputes, criminal investigations, property disputes, employment disputes and more.

  • Insurance for your tools and plant: providing protection for accidental damage, loss or theft of your tools.

There are other insurances that may be relevant, and you can find out more about them on this page.

The answer depends on the level of insurance cover you need, your business activities and the insurer providing the quotation.

The factors that impact your insurance costs are:

• The number of employees you have

• Your turnover

• Your wage roll

• Your business activities

• If you use heat

• Previous claims

• The value of any tools, plant and contract works that you wish to insure.

• And lastly, if the insurer is competitive for plumbers insurance.

We are confident that you will save money with Insuristic. We have developed our own plumbers insurance scheme.

It will take you a couple of minutes to complete our form to find out how much money you could save.

Yes, you can. It is important to tell us about any new business activities, as failing to do so may invalidate your insurer, or you may not be covered for those activities. An example could be that you have taken on a new employee with a new trade, such as a builder, or you have started offering kitchen and bathroom installations.

If anything has changed, please contact us.

If you change your businesses legal structure, for example you change from being a sole trader to a limited company during your policy year, you must tell us prior to this change via contact us. We can then arrange for your policy to be changed and new documentation issued.

You have the right to cancel your insurance within 14 days of purchasing the policy. Provided there have been no claims, you will receive a full refund on your insurance premium. This would also mean there would have been no cover from inception.

Outside of the 14-day period, you should consider cancellation carefully, as it may not be the best thing to do, even if you have stopped trading. This is because you would lose protection for you and your business if someone makes a new claim against you, even if this happened before the date you cancelled your policy.

Your considerations when cancelling:

• Employers Liability: You may not be protected if an employee is injured whilst working for you. Employers Liability insurance is a legal requirement, and you could be fined £1,000 for each day you don't have a policy.

• Public and Products Liability: If someone claims that you damaged their property or injured them during the course of your business, you wouldn't have any cover.

In addition to this, you may have purchased other covers and would lose their protection.

To cancel your policy, please contact us.