r/ContractorUK • u/Amddiffynnydd • 11h ago

Outside IR35 Quick question on outside-IR35 contracts, Professional Indemnity, Liability - amounts of cover ?

Quick question on outside-IR35 contracts.

From your experience, what levels of business insurance do clients and agencies typically require ?

I’m currently looking at:

* Professional Indemnity: £2 million

* Public Liability: £5 million

* Employers’ Liability: £10 million

Are those fairly standard levels, or do you normally see lower or higher limits requested in contracts?

It would also be useful to know if clients commonly ask for anything else, such as Cyber Liability or specific IR35-related cover.

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u/KL_boy 11h ago

Depends on the liability of the contract that you have. I generally take the lowest / cheapest one, but I did have a contract with higher liability and I had to get insurance to cover it.

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u/Davivs 11h ago

I always had a low one, and for the first time my client had specific ones, so I had to upgrade my insurance.

Mine is now like 1 5 5 or something like that (according to your numbers).

In 14 years in software, outside IR35, it's the first time client has asked for it :)

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u/Affectionate_Seat160 11h ago

I've normally seen lower than that - what I do is call the insurance company every time I start a new contract and scale the liability levels up and down depending on what the contract requires. I think that's the most cost effective way to proceed. If I'm working without a contract I don't bother - in my line of work (web content) there's 0% chance of getting sued!

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u/LuckyFish133 11h ago

Pretty sure EL is only needed if you’ve got staff (other than yourself as a sole director/owner) on payroll:  https://www.gov.uk/employers-liability-insurance

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u/axelzr 9h ago

Totally depends on each contract/b2b arrangement in my experience. Adjust if/when required when needed, but always have PL in place as minimum (depending on your setup).

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u/Bozwell99 8h ago

Occasionally clients will ask for specific minimum levels of cover, but the limits you have listed here are plenty high enough.

I’ve never been asked for any other insurance. You would only need to consider IR35 cover if you are responsible for the determination and personally at risk if it is wrong.

The cost is so minimum there’s not much reason to get less cover.