Public Liability Insurance:
What You Actually Need

A roofer in Edinburgh gets a call on Monday morning. A local letting agent wants three flat roofs done across the city centre by July. Decent money, repeat work, exactly the sort of customer he's been after. Then comes the line he's heard a hundred times: "Can you email over your insurance certificates before we put you on the books?"

And that's when he finds out he's been running a £2 million policy that excludes anything over 10 metres in height. The tenement roofs are 15. Two phone calls and forty minutes later he's still on hold to his broker, the agent has gone quiet, and the work is slipping. He had insurance. It just wasn't the right insurance.

That moment is what tradesman insurance is actually about. Not the idea of "being covered". The moment a customer, a council or a letting agent asks for proof, and the policy you bought online three years ago either gets you on the job or doesn't. Here's what each bit of cover actually does, what the small print quietly excludes, and how to stop paying for things you'll never use while still being insured for the things you actually do.

The Four Policies in Plain English

Most "tradesman insurance" bundles are made up of four separate things sold together. The labels sound alike, but they cover very different events. Knowing which is which stops you double-paying and stops you finding out the wrong way that the bit you needed wasn't in the bundle.

Public liability

Covers damage you cause to other people or their property while doing your job. Drill through a hidden pipe and flood the kitchen below. Knock a customer's lamp off a shelf. Leave a coil of cable a homeowner trips over. This is what public liability is for. It does not cover your own tools, your own van or the actual quality of the work you delivered.

Employers' liability

Covers injury to someone working for you. Apprentice, labourer, "my lad helping on Saturdays", paid mate, casual hand. If they're working under your direction and you're paying them in any form, you almost certainly need this. It is the only legally compulsory cover on this list. Minimum £5 million, and the fine for not having it is up to £2,500 a day.

Tools cover

A standalone or add-on policy that covers theft of, or damage to, the tools you own. Always separate from public liability. Usually loaded with conditions about overnight storage, how the van's locked and where it's parked. Read the wording, not the sales blurb.

Business motor cover

Your van insurance, but rated for the way you actually use it: driving to job sites with materials and tools in the back. Standard "Social, Domestic and Pleasure" private cover doesn't include carrying tools to paying customers. If your van's a working van, you need business use cover.

How Much Public Liability Do You Actually Need?

The pricing-comparison sites will push you towards "more is always better". That's only half true. The right limit isn't the biggest one a broker will sell you. It's the one that matches the customers you want to work for. There are three obvious bands.

The jump from £2 million to £5 million usually costs a few quid extra a month. Sticking at £2 million to save that and then losing out on bigger work doesn't add up. Look at the contracts you'd like to win, not the ones you've currently got, and price the policy at that level.

One thing brokers don't draw attention to: limits aren't the only number on the certificate. There's a height limit (often capped at 2, 5 or 10 metres), a heat-work clause (using a torch, blowlamp or hot-air gun), a depth limit for excavation, and rules around subcontractors. A roofer's £5 million certificate that quietly caps height at 10 metres is no use for tenement work. Always read those clauses before signing.

Employers' Liability: The One That's Actually the Law

Of all the cover on the list, this is the one to be careful about. Employers' liability is compulsory under the Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969. The moment you have someone working for you who isn't an immediate family member, you need it. Minimum cover £5 million. Fine for non-compliance is up to £2,500 per day, and the certificate has to be visible at your registered work premises or available to HSE inspectors on request.

Where one-man bands get tripped up is in the assumption that "self-employed mate helping out for cash" doesn't count. It usually does. HSE looks at the working relationship, not the label. If they turn up when you tell them to, use your van and your kit, and you tell them what to do, you're treating them as an employee. The "self-employed" sticker doesn't carry the legal weight people think it does.

The flip side: if you genuinely work alone, on jobs you've priced, with your own van, your own kit and nobody on a wage or a daily rate from you, employers' liability is not required. Plenty of brokers will still try to sell it to sole traders as "peace of mind". That's a sales pitch, not a legal one.

Tools Cover: The Bit People Get Wrong

This is the one most tradespeople get stung on. Finding out the tools weren't covered when they thought they were. Public liability doesn't cover them. Van insurance usually doesn't either, at least not the standard cover. Tools cover is a separate add-on, and even when you've bought it, the wording quietly does most of the work.

Things that typically need to be true for a tools claim to pay out:

• The van was locked, with deadlocks engaged if fitted, and any alarm armed.
• Tools were out of sight from the windows (covered, in a vault, in a separate box).
• The van was parked off-street or in a "secure compound" between certain hours (often midnight to 6am).
• Each individual tool is below a per-item limit (commonly £500 or £1,000), and high-value items declared in advance.
• You have proof of ownership: receipts, photos, or serial numbers logged with the insurer.

Tool theft is a real cost of trading, not a freak event. Vans get hit overnight, and tradespeople leave kit in them because unloading every single night isn't realistic if you live in a flat or finish a job at 9pm. A useful habit: keep receipts as a photo album on your phone, with the serial number visible. It takes two minutes per tool and saves you arguing with a loss adjuster about a Milwaukee combi you bought three years ago.

Van Insurance: Business Use, Not SDP

Standard private car insurance has three usage categories: Social, Domestic and Pleasure (SDP), Commuting, and Business. Commercial van policies have similar tiers, and many one-man bands sit on the wrong one without realising.

Carriage of Own Goods is the bit that matters. If you're delivering materials to customers as part of a separate fee (a builder hauling skips, a kitchen fitter delivering units on behalf of a supplier) you may need Hire and Reward instead, which is a step up again. For most one-man-band trades, Carriage of Own Goods is the right level.

The reason this matters: get it wrong and the insurer can declare the policy void from the start. Not just refusing the claim, but treating you as if you never had cover. The fixed-penalty fine for driving uninsured is £300 and six points if it's picked up by the police, and considerably more painful if it's discovered after an accident.

Five Exclusions to Read Before You Sign

Cheap online policies tend to be cheap because they exclude the work most tradespeople actually do. Before you click buy, run through the list and check each one against your week's jobs.

1. Height limits. Two metres, five metres, ten metres are common ceilings. If you ever work above the limit, the policy doesn't cover that job, even though the rest of your work fits.
2. "Hot works" clauses. Using a torch, blowlamp, soldering iron or grinder usually requires the policy's hot-works conditions: fire extinguisher to hand, 60-minute fire watch afterwards, no flammable material within a certain distance.
3. "Care, custody and control". The one that catches plumbers and gas engineers out. Most public liability won't cover damage to the specific item you're working on, only damage to things around it. Fit a boiler, the boiler goes faulty, that's not public liability. Flood the kitchen below, that is.
4. Subcontractor wording. Many policies cover bona-fide subcontractors only if you've kept evidence of their own public liability, and only up to a fixed turnover. If you're using subbies, check the wording carefully.
5. Workmanship. Public liability covers damage and injury, not the quality of the finish. Wonky walls, snagging, "doesn't match the sample". That's a Consumer Rights Act issue, not an insurance one.

If you take one thing from this section, take this: never assume. Read the schedule, not the brochure. The schedule is the document that decides whether a claim is paid.

The Certificate Has to Be Visible

Half the value of insurance, for a one-man band, isn't actually about claims. It's about showing the certificate at the moment a customer wavers. That moment happens more than people realise: when a homeowner has been stung before, when a letting agent is comparing three quotes, when a council needs to put you on a framework.

Which is why the next move, once you're properly covered, is making the proof visible. Insurance certificate logo on the website. NICEIC, Gas Safe, FENSA, TrustMark, SafeContractor, CHAS, whichever schemes you're in, the badges go on. Same on your Google Business Profile, in your photos and on your van. A good Google Business Profile setup includes uploading a photo of your certificate or accreditation card, because that's something Google can show alongside your listing in the local pack.

Then there's the local search angle. The customers most likely to ask "are you insured?" tend to be the cautious ones: older homeowners, landlords, professional services like solicitors and estate agents. Those customers find tradespeople through search, not Facebook. Local SEO and a tidy website are what put your accreditation logos in front of them at the moment they're deciding who to phone.

The order is: get the right cover, then make it visible. Plenty of tradespeople have decent insurance and nowhere obvious for a nervous customer to see it. That's a wasted investment.

A Quick Checklist Before You Renew

Every year, at renewal, run through the same short list. Five minutes, and it catches almost every common mistake.

• Public liability limit at £5 million if you want commercial, council or housing-association work. £2 million is fine if you're strictly domestic.
• Employers' liability in place if you've used anyone as help in the last year who isn't immediate family.
• Height limit on the schedule matches the tallest job you'd actually take.
• Heat-works clause matches your trade. Plumbers, roofers, anyone with a torch should read it twice.
• Tools cover with the right overnight-storage wording and a sensible per-item limit.
• Van insurance rated for Carriage of Own Goods, not Social, Domestic and Pleasure.
• Certificate of currency saved as a PDF on your phone, ready to forward in 30 seconds when a customer asks.
• Accreditation logos visible on your website and Google Business Profile.

If any of those are wrong or missing, fix it before you sign the renewal. Insurance is one of those bills you only test in the worst week of the year. The five minutes you spend reading the schedule properly is the same five minutes that decides whether the policy actually pays out when you need it.

Common Questions About Tradesman Insurance

Is public liability insurance a legal requirement for tradespeople in the UK?

No. Public liability is voluntary in the UK. Employers' liability is the one that's compulsory, as soon as you take on staff. But in practice, plenty of customers, councils, schools, letting agents and trade platforms will refuse to put you on a job without seeing a public liability certificate first, so it's commercially essential even if it's not legally required.

Does public liability cover my tools if they're stolen from the van?

No. Public liability is about injury to or damage caused to other people and their property. Your own tools sit in a completely separate policy called tools cover. That's usually loaded with specific conditions about overnight storage, locks and alarms. Many policies won't pay out for tools stolen from a van overnight unless it was locked, alarmed and parked off-street.

How much public liability cover do I need as a sole trader?

For domestic-only work, £1 million is the floor and £2 million is standard. For council, housing-association, school or commercial contracts, the standard ask is £5 million. The right number is whatever your biggest realistic customer demands. The price jump from £2 million to £5 million is usually small, and being shut out of larger work to save a few quid a month doesn't add up.

Do I need employers' liability if it's just my mate helping me out for cash?

Almost certainly yes. The definition of an employee covers casual helpers, labour-only subcontractors and people paid in cash. Direct family members can be exempt in some circumstances. If they're not immediate family, treat them as needing employers' liability. Minimum £5 million, and the fine for not having it is up to £2,500 per day.

Does my personal van insurance cover me for work?

Only if it's specifically rated for business use or carriage of own goods. Standard Social, Domestic and Pleasure cover doesn't include driving to job sites with tools and materials in the back. If you've got SDP cover and you have an accident on the way to a job, the insurer can refuse to pay out and treat the policy as void from the start. It's one of the easiest and cheapest things on this list to put right.

If you want the insurance certificates and accreditation badges you've already paid for to actually win you work, they need to be visible. On a clean website, on your Google Business Profile, in local search. Get in touch with Gary for a plain conversation, no hard sell, and a site live within 48 hours of go-ahead.