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In
this section we have:
All
about insurance for home businesses and the self-employed
UK
Homeworking statistics and trends 2005/2006
Simply
Business insurance for home workers
If
you are self-employed or a sole trader and run
your business from home, you might wonder why
you need insurance. After all, what could possibly
happen that your existing buildings and contents
insurance wouldn't cover?
The
answer is that you don't want to find out what
could happen, but if you did find out the hard
way you would seriously regret missing it out
of your business planning.
There are currently over 3.5 million home working
professionals in the UK and the number is growing.
If you are one of them - perhaps a professional
consultant, beautician, trainer, plumber, financial
advisor, property investor or a small business
owner - you will need insurance covers that match
your individual needs.
Simply
Business offers comparative quotes to self-employed
professionals, tradesmen and small businesses
through its website. Completing one simple form
will produce a range of quotes from our panel
of leading insurers. You can view the policy for
each quote online and then if you are happy you
can buy instantly online, or if you have questions
you can run through them with someone at our UK
contact centre.
Public
Liability Insurance
Whether
or not you deal directly with associates or clients
in your home, you should still take out public
liability cover. This protects you from financial
loss if a member of the public is injured or their
property damaged, through the fault of you or
your business activities.
If
you do invite clients or employees into your home,
someone could make a claim for compensation against
you if, for example, they tripped, fell and were
injured. Similarly if they had brought an expensive
piece of equipment, which was damaged as a result
of your actions, they would expect to be compensated
for the cost of repairs or replacement.
Public
liability insurance can pay out on all such claims
and it also covers for visits to third party premises
as well. So if you are a plumber and are out on
site, you will be insured for accident and injury
claims by your customer.
Professional
Indemnity Insurance
If
your work involves giving professional advice
or providing business services, you should really
take our professional indemnity insurance.
It
protects your business against client claims arising
from bad advice or negligence on your part. The
insurance covers the legal cost of defending the
claim and any compensation payout awarded to your
clients.
While
it is not a legal requirement, having this type
of cover not only protects you, but it also gives
your clients confidence in your service. They
may choose your business over someone else's just
because they know you carry professional indemnity
protection.
Professional
indemnity insurance can be expensive and many
professionals feel that if they are quoted too
low a price then there must be something wrong
with that policy. In reality, the level of cover
you need determines the cost of the premiums,
and it would be foolish to pay more than necessary.
Office
contents, equipment and stock cover
You
may think that the equipment you use for your
business activities is covered by your regular
home contents insurance. It isn't.
You
should take out enough cover to protect your computer
and office equipment, any stock, tools, furniture
and portable items such as laptops.
Compare
quotes for the best deal
Insurance
for your work shouldn't cost the earth, so shop
around for the best deal. Using a comparison site
such as Simply Business enables you to compare
quotes from different insurers at the same time.
You can view all the policies online and buy instantly.
Simply Business also has a UK call centre with
staff who are happy to talk you through the quotes
to help you find the right one for your needs.
Home
Based Professional
Home
Based Professional Insurance is a package of insurance
covers (including public and employer's liability)
designed to protect your home based business against
financial loss.
Get
Home Business Insurance Quotes
There
is currently an estimated 3.5 million home working
professionals in UK and is set to rise to 5 million
over the next 18 months.
Key
Features
Home
working professionals can be broadly split into
2 groups:
×
Home based business
× Company employees working from home
The
vast majority of insurers distinguish between
personal and business activities, a specific policy
needs to be effected to cover all business related
equipment, whether or not you are a home based
business or a company employee working from home.
Who
is it for?
Primarily
home based professionals:
×
Accountants
× Consultants and Surveyors
× Architects
× Lawyers
× Graphic Designers
× Marketing related activities
× Recruitment businesses etc.
However
this policy also provides cover in the following
additional sectors:
×
Retail related
× Entertainment and Leisure
× Consultants and Surveyors
× Health and Beauty
For
Building and Construction related occupations
and General Tradesmen please visit our self employed
area for comparative quotations.
Get
Home Business Insurance Quotes
Benefits
×
Legal requirement - If you have employees you
have a legal obligation to have Employer's Liability
cover
×
Public liability cover - Cover for your dealings
with the public or those you trade with including
people visiting your premises. This section also
provides cover for working at third party sites
×
Cover for business related contents - Computers,
furniture, portable equipment including laptops
and stock etc
×
Policy documents immediately - You can receive
your insurance documents seconds after buying
insurance through our system
×
Additional insurance - Business Interruption,
Loss of money Personal Accident and Travel cover
can also be added to your policies
×
Peace of mind - your business is covered, leaving
you to get on with running it!
Things
to watch out for
×
Existing Home Insurance - Many think an existing
standard household policy will cover home offices
and associated contents together with business
liability insurance. This is not the case.
×
Limit of Indemnity - Some insurers will quote
you a public liability cover from £1m to
£5m. You may only need £1m of cover.
However if you do need £5m of public liability
cover, make sure you get the right quote
×
Office Contents - Make sure you value your contents
accurately and select the correct level of indemnity
under the policy. Remember if you are underinsured
insurers will not pay 100% of your claim
×
Excess - make sure you check the level of excess
(the amount you pay in the event of a claim) under
the policy. Some policies have a minimum excess
of £500 whilst others can be as low as £50
×
Working outside UK - some insurers won't cover
you if you do any of your work outside the United
Kingdom, others will extend coverage to the boundaries
of EU and beyond, so check the small print.
×
Portable equipment - Some policies exclude cover
for portable equipment, therefore if you require
cover for laptops etc, make sure there is appropriate
cover under the policy
×
Business Interruption - Should you suffer a large
loss, policies have provision to provide payment
to get the business back up and running, at a
relatively low additional premium.
×
Additional covers available - Stock, Personal
Accident and Annual Travel and Professional Indemnity
What
are the next steps?
×
Know your business - Ensure you inform the insurer
with as much information as possible so they can
provide you with the most competitive quotation.
Make sure to answer all questions on the online
form
×
Wages and turnover - Knowing your total wage roll
and estimated turnover will help if you have them
×
Start date - Insurance prices change frequently,
evaluate your desired start date, you may wish
to have the insurance start at the beginning of
a particular project
×
Compare insurers - check the type of cover you
want by comparing a number of insurers to see
if the policy that is being offered is being offered
at the right price and degree of cover, and try
and use someone who can offer you quotes from
more than one insurer
Frequently
asked questions
Am
I covered for the provision of advice?
Not unless you buy a specific Professional Indemnity
policy. Some policies offer Professional Indemnity
as part of the policy package, if you need cover
for the provision of advice to customers, check
it is specifically covered.
What
happens if my laptop is stolen?
Some insurers cover this as standard, others as
an optional extra. Check your cover and make a
claim by telephoning your insurer direct and quote
your policy reference
I
don't recognise the Insurer name
You may not immediately recognise some of these
insurers, specialist insurers tend to deal only
through brokers and don't sell direct to the public.
All the insurers we work with are regulated and
authorised by the Financial Services Authority,
the UK's regulatory body.
Do
I need Employer's Liability?
If you have employees, the answer is usually yes.
If you are a single person company, the answer
is usually no.
Can
I include my household business with my business
insurance policy?
This depends as different insurers provide different
types of cover, however yes this is possible.
Get
Home Business Insurance Quotes
Homeworking
Statistics and Trends 2005/2006
(revised
24th July 2006)
Definitions
of ‘home-based business’ and ‘home-based
worker’ (as used by various sources).
The term ‘home-based business’
means any business or self-employed person that
uses a residential property as a base from which
to run their operation, consciously doing so rather
than maintaining a separate workspace.
The term ‘home-based worker’
covers all categories of people who work from
home, either as a home-based business, as an employee
or a combination of the two.
Foreword
(taken from Labour Market Trends, October 2005,
published by UK National Statistics http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_labour/LMT_Oct05.pdf)
Enterprises
in the UK
The
number of enterprises in the UK continues to rise.
There were an estimated 4.3 million business enterprises
in the UK at the start of 2004 compared with 4.0
million at the start of 2003. This is the largest
increase since the series began in 1994.
Almost all business enterprises (99.3%) are small
(0 to 49 employees). Only 26,000 (0.6%) are medium-sized
(50 to 249 employees) and 6,000 (0.1%) are large
(250 or more employees).
UK enterprises employ an estimated 22.0 million
people, and have an estimated combined annual
turnover of £2,400 billion. Small and medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs) together account for more than
half of the private sector employment (58.5%)
and turnover (51.3%) in the UK.
Most enterprises (3.1 million) have no employees,
equivalent to 72.8% of all enterprises. However
the proportion without employees varies among
different industries, from 86.6% of businesses
in construction to 17.9% for enterprises in the
hotels and restaurants sector.
Of the 4.3 million enterprises in the UK at the
start of 2004, 2.72 million were sole proprietors,
540,000 were partnerships, and 1.02 million were
companies. Most of the increase in the number
of enterprises to the start of 2004 is due to
a rise of 230,000 (13%) in the number of unregistered
sole proprietorships, plus a rise of 20,000 (13%)
in the number of un-registered partnerships.
These figures are estimated using
the Labour Force Survey, which showed an increase
in the number of self-employed people in the UK
during 2003.
Also continuing the trend from 2002 to 2003, the
number of registered companies rose over 60,000(7%),
while the number of registered sole proprietor-ships
fell by less than 40,000 (5%) and the number of
registered partnerships fell by less than 20,000
(5%) to the start of 2004. Overall, these data
from the Inter-Departmental Business Register
show that the number of registered businesses
rose by nearly 10,000 between the start of 2003
and the start of 2004.
Focusing on enterprises without employees, the
lar gest increases have been in construction and
business services, which have both had an increase
of 70,000 enterprises. Most other industries have
had an increase in this category too, but agriculture
and fishing had a small decrease of 7,000.
___________________________________________
‘The rise and rise of the UK homeworker’
(taken from the website http://flexibility.co.uk,
sourced from Labour Market Trends, October 2005
by Yolanda Ruiz and Annette Walling, published
by UK National Statistics)
2005
stats show homeworking and teleworking still increasing
The
boundaries between home and work are becoming
increasingly blurred for many UK workers. Now
3.1 million people are regular home-based workers.
Of these 2.4 million are teleworkers - people
who work with computers and telecommunications
to work at or from home.
The growth of both homeworking and in particular
teleworking has been one of the most marked features
of workforce change in recent years, as the following
table shows:
Growth in homeworking and teleworking: (millions
and % of UK workforce):
Homeworkers 1997 - 2.3 (9%) 2001
- 2.6 (10%) 2005 - 3.1 (11%)
Teleworkers 1997 - 0.9 (4%) 2001
- 1.5 (5%) 2005 - 2.4 (8%)
The
figures above refer to people who work "mainly"
in their own home or use their home as a base.
It does not include occasional home or teleworkers.
The survey found a million people working at home
in the reference week who do not work mainly from
home.
As well as not including less frequent/occasional
homeworkers, the report also does not include
people who work in the same grounds or building
as their home. So if you work from a workshop
at the end of the garden or a garden office, you're
probably not in the figures. And mobile teleworkers
who sometimes work at home, but don't consider
it their "base" are also left out.
So the figures are in some respects an under-reporting
of the phenomenon. Other surveys show that for
employed teleworkers 1-2 days per week is the
norm, so they won't fall into the "mainly"
working from home category.
This is an area where more research needs to be
carried out. It is the extent and nature of occasional
teleworking that gives us an insight into how
it may develop in the future.
The
figures show there is a strong connection between
self-employment and homeworking.
Employed: 34%/homeworkers; 36%/teleworkers;
87%/all workers
Self-employed: 64%/homeworkers; 62%/teleworkers;
13%/all workers
Some
41% of self-employed people are teleworkers.
However, employed teleworking lags behind. Only
4% of employees currently telework ( that is "mainly"
work from home rather than occasionally).
There are two lessons to be drawn from these
findings:
The
home is the hub of tremendous economic energy,
and the focus for much entrepreneurship and business
innovation. This is despite public policy which
is based on separating work from the home.
Large employers are relatively slow to recognise
the potential of the home being a base for their
employees. We feel this is changing, but at the
moment it is mainly managers and professionals
who are allowed (or allow themselves) to work
from home as employees.
The
importance of mobility
According
to the analysts at National Statistics, "The
upward trend in teleworking rates (the proportion
of the workforce who are teleworkers) has been
driven mainly by an increase in people teleworking
from different places with home as a base".
This is in many ways a natural development. The
new technologies used for teleworking are increasingly
"footloose" with laptop and tablet computers,
handheld devices, plus the increasing availability
of wireless access technologies.
Working from home is just one of many options
for remote working. The point is to work from
wherever is the most effective place to get the
job done.
Regional
differences
The
report also notes some regional variations, with
the southern regions of England having higher
levels of homeworking and teleworking.
To some extent these figures raise more questions
than answers. The regions of England are artificial
constructions, and all the average regional figures
mask significant variations. As other reports
have found, the more remote rural areas usually
have much higher than average levels of home-based
self-employment.
The region with the highest levels is the South-East.
A key reason may be the high costs of property.
Working from home as self-employed or running
a micro-business takes away the need for an expensive
business overhead. A further reason may be that
it is in the South-East that broadband technologies
were first rolled out. Difficulties in commuting
no doubt also are an incentive to work from home.
What
next?
The
search for a better work-life balance, rising
property costs, the availability of new technologies
and an upsurge in domestic entrepreneurship all
contribute to the continuing upward trend in working
from home.
We see no prospect of these trends levelling off
in the near future. Patterns of early adoption
which dominate in the South East will spread throughout
the UK. That is managers, professionals and technical
workers - two thirds of them male at the moment
- will adopt these new ways of home based working
first.
But the trends show that there is also a "normalisation"
process, with increasing numbers of women working
from home, and also more lower-skilled process
jobs migrating to the home environment.
Now it is up to policy makers to recognise the
significance of the trends, and plan for more
balanced, less commuting-orientated communities.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The
Commission for Rural Communities (posted
24th July 2006)
Home
Based Work in Rural England
- extract from statistics and actions
Statistics
on home-based working in rural England:
More
than one in nine economically active residents
of rural England (11.8%) work mainly from home.
This represents 638,000 people and is a higher
percentage share than the proportion found across
England as a whole - 9.16% (over 2 million people)
or, in the urban areas outside London (8.32%,
Census 2001).
There is strong correlation between those working
from home and self-employment, with 51% of home-based
workers being self-employed (1,053,000 people)
in England as a whole, rising to almost 3 in every
5 (58%) in rural areas.
Of the economically active, a greater proportion
are self-employed in rural areas than in urban:
16.3% (881,000 people) in rural compared to 12.17%
(2,073,000) in urban districts (Census 2001).
Despite the scale of this group, more than half
of the economic development departments in 145
rural districts (pre-2005 definition of ‘rural’
areas) admit to not using readily-available information
on home-based working to inform their policies
and strategies.
In
recent years several Countryside Agency studies
and projects touched on home working: studies
into the ‘Role of Women in Rural Economies’
and the ‘Impact of Migration into Rural England’;
action research in the North East on raising an
enterprise culture; and
support for self-employed projects for women and
young people with WIRE (Women in Rural Economies),
Prince’s Trust, DALE and Goole Development
Trust.
In
2004 we commissioned the Live/Work Network to
research and publish the report Under The Radar
- tracking and supporting Rural Home-Based Businesses’.
This provides for the first time a comprehensive
profile of rural home-workers and their needs.
It also recommends actions for several tiers and
types of organisations - public and private.
Actions
for Government Departments
recognise
the social and economic significance of home-based
businesses in our rural economies. These include
widening the base of employment, reducing commuting,
revitalising ‘daytime’ economies, improving
prospects for disadvantaged groups and increasing
mixed use of properties. These changes will lead
to more sustainable rural communities;
address current weaknesses in support for home-based
businesses: Live/Work research found almost no
specifically-targeted assistance by responsible
agencies, such as the Small Business Service and
RDA’s. One government organisation should
have lead-responsibility for promoting and tracking
the effective support of rural home-based businesses;
consider including greater support for home-based
businesses in a cross-department Public Service
Agreement and in comprehensive performance-assessment
criteria for all local authorities.
Actions
for Regional Development Agencies and regional
government
establish
the incidence of home-based business in each region.
Work with observatories and others to set statistical
benchmarks to enable future trends to be tracked
and to identify hot spots. This information should
be linked to clear targets for assistance given
to rural home-based businesses for Business Link
Operators;
develop strategies for home-based business as
part of Regional Economic Strategies and supporting
strategies;
support for home-based business could be one means
of delivering PSA targets of increasing employment
rates of disadvantaged groups as lone parents
and people aged 50+.
Actions
for local government
research
the incidence and impact of home-based working
in each borough/district including its effects
on housing, jobs, businesses and transport;
work with local strategic partnerships to incorporate
support for home-based businesses into strategies
and encourage these and any business brokers to
direct resources to micro-enterprises;
mainstream support for home-based businesses and
audit resources spent on all businesses to ensure
that efforts are equitably-distributed;
incorporate support for home-based working and
live/work property in planning and housing activity.consider
developing ‘hub’ facilities to offer
home-based businesses a range of services.
For further information, contact: Paul Penny cook,
Enterprise & Skills Team, Commission for Rural
Communities, Tel: 01242 533438, Email: paul.pennycook@countryside.gov.uk
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Under
the Radar
Tracking and Supporting Rural Home-based Business
How
do people earn a living in rural areas, now that
only 4% of the rural population work in agriculture?
A new report for the UK Commission for Rural Communities
(a division of the Countryside Agency) sets about
exploding some of the myths and poses some challenges
about the rural economy in the 21st century.
The focus of the report, Under the Radar, is on
home-based businesses which form a potentially
dynamic but unsung Cinderella sector creating
wealth and employment in rural areas.
The two key questions posed by the report are:
Why
does the value of this sector go largely unrecognised
by business support agencies and policy makers?
What
should public authorities at every level do to
respond and how can they maximise the potential?
Homeworking
more common in rural areas
One of the particular strengths of this report
is that it is strongly evidence-based. A huge
amount of evidence has been marshalled from official
and other sources, to present a convincing picture
of the strength of the homeworking economy.
Amongst the data pulled together by the authors
are the following:
Home-based
working in the UK had risen to almost 3.3 million
in the Spring of 2004, according to Labour Market
Trends.
766,000 people work from home in the 145 English
rural districts (the focus of the report)
This 11.6% of the rural workforce working from
home compares to 8% of the urban workforce
56% of self-employed people are home-based
Nationally, 39% of small businesses are home-based;
in rural areas it is 55%
60% of rural homeworkers are men, 40% women
What
are home-based workers doing?
The nature of homeworking has changed radically
over the course of the last century. Most people
who worked at home at the time of the 1901 Census
were women engaged in dress-making and laundry
work.
There remains a minority of low-paid homeworking
jobs. But over the past 15 years or so the availability
of new technologies has transformed the nature
of home-based work, not least in rural areas.
This takes two forms:
New
economy jobs dependent on the new ICT, where skilled
professional or lower-skilled data processing
is carried out from remote locations
More traditional occupations can become more viable
as business start-ups as the new technologies
are used to overcome distance, so for example
craft products can reach a far greater market,
or customers can be enticed to come from afar.
In around 50% of cases, according to the report,
home-based businesses are started up by incomers
to rural areas, something that the authors feel
should be encouraged and supported.
Many people are running more than one business
enterprise, and many also combine part-time employment
with self-employment.
What
is the impact of home based business in rural
areas?
Rural England has faced many challenges over the
past 20 years. Thousands of post offices, villages
shops and pubs have closed, leaving many communities
without local services. The growth of home-based
working can help to recreate local economies,
and revitalise dormitory towns and villages.
The authors also point out the "sustainable
communities impact". Potential benefits of
home-based work include:
use of one property not two (i.e. for home
and work)
less need to build new workspace to accommodate
employment growth
village and town centre renaissance
reduction in commuting travel
increased security - more homes occupied during
the daytime
an enhanced role for market towns providing 'hub'
facilities.
So
what should be done?
At the moment this growth in home-based enterprise
is slipping "under the radar". There
is a plethora of agencies with fingers in the
pie of rurality and economic development, but
there is little evidence of anyone getting to
grips with the issues.
As the report says: "What is rare is any
cross-theme thinking that sees the success of
home-based business as being good for wealth creation
as well as for the community and the environment.
Put simply, planning and economic development
departments are not doing enough to connect the
two issues together and work at supporting the
new home-based working sector".
The business support agencies come under fire
from many of the interviewees in the report, as
well as from the authors. Most of the support
available is jargon-ridden, bureaucratic and is
geared to growth and expansion models rather than
sole entrepreneurs.
Networking models, however are held up as examples
of good practice - where public money supports
self -help networks and hubs where home-based
workers can network and have access to facilities.
The report has many suggestions for public policy
responses: for central government, Regional Development
Agencies and local authorities as well as Business
Links.
The recommendations include:
gathering
evidence about local home-based businesses and
their needs
supporting
networking and hub initiatives
encourage the in-migration of high earners
support mentoring initiatives
simplify the processes of applying for funding.
And
above all, home-based business in rural areas
needs to come onto the radar.
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