Business Advice You Can Trust
You’ve invested a lot of time and effort to build your business. But do you have the right insurance in place to protect everything you’ve worked to achieve? Having the right insurance for your business can mean the difference between surviving and thriving. The world is full of opportunities but with those come risk. To ensure you have the right coverage in place talk to an insurance broker.
No matter how large or small your business, a broker can assist you in obtaining sufficient, affordable options. By having the right type of insurance you will have peace of mind, that in the event of litigation, or even natural disaster you will be protected.
What is Business Insurance?
Like home insurance, business insurance is a contract between you and an insurance carrier protecting you against specific losses. It is the responsibility of business owners to provide all of the necessary information to their insurance carrier regarding their business to ensure they have the correct coverage in place. An insurance broker can work with you to plan for all eventualities and limit exposures to risk.
Types of Insurance
No two businesses are the same. Your insurance should protect you from losses based on your individual needs. Some traditional types of insurance as well as more specialized insurance for businesses are listed below:
Professional Liability (Errors and Omissions)
This type of insurance protects professionals against liability for damages caused in performance of professional duties and is mandatory for some professions (lawyers, doctors, architects, dentists etc.). It also covers the cost of defense for alleged errors.
Directors & Officers
This type of insurance insures corporate directors and officers of boards against claims alleging errors, omissions, neglect or a breach of duty/mismanagement to the business.
Commercial General Liability (CGL)
CGL, is coverage that will protect your business in the event that you are sued. CGL coverage is designed to protect against bodily injury or property damage claims.
Commercial Fleet Insurance
Fleet insurance is a single insurance coverage that a company buys to cover all of its vehicles.
Business Interruption Insurance
This is insurance to protect your business from lost revenue due to the interruption of business. For many businesses this coverage could be the difference between continued success or closing their doors for good. As a result, business owners should carefully review this coverage with their broker to understand what types of disruptions are covered, financial compensation method and limits, and for what period of time.
Key Person Insurance
Businesses look to this type of insurance so that the death or unexpected departure of a major executive will not hinder the businesses ability to function.
Cyber Liability Insurance
This type of insurance covers risks related to online business. Cyber liability coverage is insurance coverage for liability that arises out of unauthorized use of, or unauthorized access to, electronic data or software within your network or business. Cyber liability policies also provide coverage for liability claims for spreading a virus or malicious code, computer theft, extortion, or any unintentional act, mistake, error, or omission made by your employees while performing their job.
Surety Bond
A surety bond is a contract among three parties. A surety bond is a promise to pay one party (the obligee) a specified amount if a second party (the principal) fails to fulfilling the terms of a contract.
Tips For Managing Risk
A well thought out risk management plan can assist you in predicting potential situations that could hurt your business.
- Get assistance from your insurance broker in assessing potential risk situations. They have expertise and experience in this area.
- Review any previous claims to address gaps in coverage or identify risk areas.
- Ensure staff are properly trained and screened.
- Assign someone in your organization as the risk manager to assist in identifying and dealing with potential risks.
- Keep a list of assets and update it regularly. Inform your broker of changes to the list.
A Business Continuity Plan
A business continuity plan is a plan to continue operations if a place of business (e.g., an office, work site or data center) is affected by adverse physical conditions, such as a storm, fire or crime. Such a plan typically explains how the business would recover its operations or move operations to another location. For example, if a fire destroys an office building or data center, the people and business or data center operations would relocate to a recovery site.
The plan could include recovering from different levels of disaster which can be short time, localized disasters, to days long building wide problems, to a permanent loss of a building. Any event that could negatively impact operations is included in the plan, such as supply chain interruption, loss of or damage to critical infrastructure (major machinery or computing /network resource). Be ready for anything - Talk to your Broker.