Self Employed May Not Be Covered by Contents Insurance
New research by Direct Line suggests that many self employed people who are working from home believe their personal home contents insurance covers their business.
This new research by RBS owned Direct Line (soon to be sold off in the wake of the credit crunch bail out) said that only 34% of self employed people who work in their own home had office contents insurance in additional to their existing home contents policy.
The research conducted by asking 900 self employed people who called them up for quotes and who worked at home what their insurance situation was and the main result was that nearly 30% did not have any additional cover at all whilst undertaking their work including professional indemnity insurance, public liability insurance or cover for their potential expensive computer equipment.
Whilst 82% said they already had private home contents insurannce (a startling statistic in itself that 18% did not have this cover) only a third had additional cover for their business requirements. A third polled also had public liability insurance but with this shows that when it comes to insurance products during a recession it’s one of the first items to be seen as a luxury especially if no claims have been made in previous years.
More research made by one of the big comparison websites suggests that only 4% of people who trust a bank run by one of the big supermarkets rather than a traditional high street bank despite all the issues surrounding the bank bailouts by the UK government and the credit crunch crisis. The issue appears to be around big financial products such as mortgages because whilst just 5% would take out a mortgage from a supermarket 23% would take out insurance and 24% would take a credit card – these latter items are easy decisions to make and although currently all supermarket banks are subsidiaries of the major banks in any case they are not branded as such. Previous research has suggested that the rates on offer by the supermarket banks are not competitive in any case.
Even more research now from another comparison website says that 65% of UK homes now don’t have heating breakdown cover. Previously it would be British Gas who offered this at incredibly high rates but because of increased competition it can be had for as low as £10 per month. Another piece of insurance that people are reluctant to purchase in times of hardship but could be worth it because faulty boilers can kills (although you can purchase detectors to help with this matter).
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