Business Insurance 101

• Business Insurance Basics

  Whether you own a small start-up or are the head of a successful commercial empire, you need to protect yourself and everything you have invested into your business against accidents and incidents that are difficult to predict. The best way to do this is through business insurance.

• What kinds of business insurance are there?

  There are four areas of your business that you need to protect through business insurance. If you are searching for an insurance plan or upgrading the one that you already have, here is a checklist to make sure you have all your bases covered.

• Property Insurance

  This is probably the most commonly considered insurance when people think about which part of their businesses they need to protect. Property insurance covers any physical assets associated with your business, including your office, equipment, transportation and records.

• Liability Insurance

  This kind of insurance protects you against law suits from clients and/or customers. In the event that one of your clients feels you have caused irreparable harm to him or her through neglect or a mistake in how you provide your services, liability insurance will come in handy. To calculate how much liability protection you need, you can either insure your business for its total dollar value or model your policy using information from past legal settlements involving businesses similar to yours.

• Personnel Insurance

  If your business employs people besides yourself, you will need to decide whether you will provide them with a group health insurance option. While this kind of insurance is not required by law, many business owners see it as an investment in the well-being of their companies to provide a way to keep their employees physically and mentally strong.

• Another type of insurance that is required by law is worker’s compensation. This will help pay the medical expenses of your employees, and sometimes provide them with income, if they are ever hurt on the job.

• Business Interruption Insurance

  A business income insurance plan can help protect a very important yet non-tangible aspect of your business--its ability to make money. Income insurance can provide you with the funds to relocate to a temporary location and continue to conduct business as usual if your company experiences a natural disaster, for example.