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An unforeseen event at your office could have a serious impact on your business, so it’s worthwhile considering taking out the appropriate level of office insurance.
Anything from a fire or flood to a break-in could result in thousands of pounds worth of damage. Our office insurance covers you for these risks and more.
We offer a range of different types of cover, including buildings and contents insurance, business equipment cover and business interruption insurance, to comprehensively protect your property against a multitude of risks. Each policy can be tailored to meet the individual needs of your business and our fast and easy office insurance quote system allows you to choose the cover you want at a price you can afford.
Office cover at a glance:
- Cover for accidental damage, loss or theft
- Protection for portable equipment used off-site
- Includes laptops, phones and specialist tools
- Flexible limits to suit your business size
- Available as add-on to other policies
What is office insurance?
Office insurance is designed to protect your business against unexpected events concerning your workplace. This can include cover for damage to the structure of your building, as well as protection against the loss of or damage to your office equipment. It can also cover risks associated with members of the public and/or your employees, and risks to your finances and reputation.
When office equipment is unexpectedly lost or damaged, office contents insurance is there to ensure you and your business don’t lose out. Whether it’s as the result of an office burglary or break-in, or a damaged photocopier is causing you a headache, an office contents insurance policy will have you covered. The same goes for office chairs, desks, PCs, laptops and monitors, and much more besides.
Why choose Markel for office insurance?
At Markel, we understand the importance of having office insurance that meets the specific needs of your business. With over 30 years’ experience insuring small businesses, consultants, contractors and self-employed professionals, we know exactly what our customers are looking for. Here are just some of the reasons to buy office insurance from us:
Office insurance cover from
£5.00 per month*
*The £5 a month premium referenced is based on property damage insurance with a £10,000 level of cover.
Who needs office insurance?
If you have a physical office space, you can benefit from having both your building and its contents insured. Whether you experience a fire, flood, break-in or another unexpected event, you could be left facing major costs. As well as the expenses associated with repairing or replacing equipment, you are likely to suffer lost productivity, which in turn means missed deadlines, lost earnings and potential damage to your reputation. Office insurance can be tailored to protect you from all of these risks, as well as other dangers associated with your workspace.
We provide office insurance to suit the needs of any type of business, from architects to bookkeepers, IT consultants, estate agents, web designers and more.
What kind of office insurance do I need?
The kind of office insurance policy that you need will depend on the specific requirements of your business. Broadly speaking though, there are four main areas that you may wish to cover. These are:
- Premises and equipment
- People (including your employees and/or members of the public)
- Finances
- Reputation
How it works
Choose the cover you require
Get a quote you need in minutes
Buy online or contact one of our advisors
What does office insurance cover?
Office insurance can help to protect your business against losses resulting from damage to your office premises, contents, and equipment. This may include being covered in the event of a fire, flood, theft, or accidental damage.
An office insurance policy can provide financial support to repair damage, replace essential items, and help your business continue operating following an unexpected incident, following:
What is covered
What is not covered
What level of office insurance cover do I need?
At Markel, we make it easy to tailor your cover so that you have exactly the right level of protection. When deciding how much office insurance you need, you should take a variety of factors into account, such as the value of your assets and what a day of lost productivity would cost you. Please note that office insurance policies is only available to activities covered by Markel Direct.
If you’d like to discuss your options, don’t hesitate to contact us today.
- Buildings and contents insurance covers your office premises against accidental damage (including theft and damage caused by disasters such as fire, flood, explosion or storm) to office buildings, office contents and computer equipment. Few businesses could survive an incident that destroyed their premises and contents, so give this cover careful consideration (please note that buildings insurance is not available for homeworkers, but you can cover your home office contents).
- Business equipment insurance covers against loss, theft and accidental damage to vital equipment that you take with you while undertaking your business' activities, including laptops, smartphones, tablets and projectors.
- Business interruption insurance covers any loss of income (or increased costs of working) if you are unable to work from your usual business premises. This cover could save your business thousands of pounds if you have to be re-sited during repairs or if you cannot fulfil your contractual obligations.
Please note that buildings insurance is not available for homeworkers, but you can cover your home office contents.
Example policy documents
If you have an existing policy with us, please sign in to view your policy documents.
Below you will find examples of the documents provided.
Portable equipment policy wording
Do I need professional indemnity insurance for my office?
If your business offers advice or provides a professional service, you may benefit from including professional indemnity cover in your office insurance policy. For example, you may fall into this category if you handle client data, provide recommendations or deal with intellectual property. Professional indemnity insurance covers you if one of your clients suffers a financial loss because of your negligence. It’s also worth noting that some professional bodies require their members to put this type of protection in place.
Do I need employers' liability insurance for my office?
If you have one or more employees, unless you meet specific exemption criteria, you are legally required to have a minimum of £5 million of employers’ liability insurance in place. This type of cover protects you if an employee suffers an accident or injury while at work.
Do I need public liability insurance for my office?
If you have customers or other members of the public visiting your office, you should consider taking out public liability insurance. This type of protection is designed to cover the legal fees and compensation costs if a third party is injured in your office or their property is damaged.
Do I need business interruption insurance for my office?
An often-overlooked form of cover, business interruption insurance protects against the financial losses you would incur (or additional costs in working) as a result of an interruption to your business’ activities. For example, if your workplace was flooded and it took months to dry out, you would have to find an alternative workplace. This could have a severe financial impact on your business’ operations - including the additional costs involved in renting an alternative premises, or losing out on projects you can’t complete because you aren’t based in your normal workplace.
In short, if you feel your business would struggle to survive an interruption to its normal activities, you should give serious consideration to business interruption insurance.
Indicative quotes
Community hall
- Community group
- 10 volunteers
- £70,000 turnover
- Solihull
- (£201.60/yr)
- £20.16/mo
- Portable equipment £3,000.00
- Public liability £5m
- Employers' liability £10m
- Cyber
Pilates instructor
- Sole trader
- 0 employees
- £42,000 turnover
- Bedford
- (£347.20/yr)
- £34.72/mo
- Portable equipment £20,000
- PI & PL £1m
- Employers' liability
- Cyber
Photographer
- Sole trader
- 0 employees
- £60,000 turnover
- Luton
- (£380.80/yr)
- £38.08/mo
- Portable equipment £20,000
- PI & PL £1m
- Employers' liability
- Cyber
*Final price payable is subject to underwriting criteria and acceptance. AI images are used on this website to depict example customer types. Any resemblance to an actual person is purely coincidental.
How much does office insurance cost?
At Markel Direct, we offer specialist office insurance from £5 a month for property damage insurance with a £10,000 level of cover*. The price of office insurance varies from business to business depending on;
- The size of your business - your turnover and whether you have any employees
- The level of cover you choose
- The value of your assets or contents you need to insure.
Ready to build your quote?
Our simple quote process will help you to find the right business insurance for your individual needs.
More specialist cover
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Professional indemnity insurance
Professional indemnity insurance covers the cost of defending your business against allegations of professional negligence (such as giving your client incorrect or wrongful advice) and any compensation or damages subsequently awarded against you. This is essential insurance if you provide advice, designs or services to your client. Cover is available with limits ranging from £50,000 to £5m.
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Public and product liability insurance
Public and product liability insurance covers the cost of defending your business (including damages awarded against you if unsuccessful) if someone is injured, or their property damaged, which arises from you going about your business or supplying products. This is an important cover for consultants that regularly deal with clients or members of the public. Limits range from £1m to £5m.
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Employer's liability insurance
Employer’s liability insurance is a legal requirement if your business has employees. It covers your business against claims for injury or illness suffered by employees arising from their employment. If you employ staff, even on a part time basis, you almost certainly need this cover. Cover for £10m.
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Directors and officers insurance
Directors and officers insurance covers the costs of defending you as a director or officer of your company against allegations of wrongful acts and any damages subsequently awarded against you. Cover is also provided in respect of the legal costs and expenses of defending actions for disqualification as a director, investigations and extradition proceedings. Limits range from £25,000 to £5m.
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Occupational personal accident
Occupational personal accident insurance can help you maintain an income if you're accidentally injured at work.
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Legal expenses insurance
Legal expenses insurance pays your legal costs and expenses for contract disputes, tax enquiries (including IR35), attending jury service, debt recovery, personal injury, as well as any award you are required to pay following an employment dispute with an employee. Limit of £100,000.
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Cyber and data insurance
Cyber and data risks insurance helps you when you're the victim of a targeted cyber attack, paying the costs of restoring data and equipment, informing clients, meeting ransom demands and loss of your net profit. It also pays your legal defence costs and damages you are legally liable to pay to other parties.
Frequently asked questions
These frequently asked questions are designed to help you and include questions relating to policy cover, pricing and ‘technical’ terms.
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Do I need office insurance if I run my business from home?
If you run your business from home, it’s unlikely that you’d be able to rely on your home insurance policy to cover all your costs if something goes wrong. It may be insufficient to cover your equipment and it won’t provide protection if an employee or customer had an accident while in your home. You should speak to your home cover provider to make sure you are not violating the terms of your policy and to find out exactly what you are protected against. The chances are though that you could benefit from taking out tailored office insurance.
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Do I need insurance if I work in a co-working space?
If you work in a commercial co-working space, the owner of the building should have insurance for office premises that covers the possessions of the people using it, and they should have public liability cover too. However, always check to make sure exactly what protection is in place.
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Can you cover equipment outside of my office?
Our office equipment insurance covers against loss, theft and accidental damage to vital equipment that you take with you while undertaking your business’ activities, including laptops, smartphones, tablets and projectors.
Simply enter the value you would like insured on the quote form next to the question ‘What is the value of office contents and/or business equipment which you wish to insure whilst in the confines of your office and outside of your office?’
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What's the excess?
An excess is the amount you have to pay towards the total cost of an insurance claim. We will then contribute the rest – up to the limit of the cover.
For all of our office insurance policies the excess is £250.
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What other types of cover are available?
As well as office insurance policies, which can include employers’ liability, public liability, professional indemnity and business interruption insurance, we offer a range of other types of cover. They include:
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How are Markel Direct regulated?
Markel Direct is a trading name of Markel International Insurance Company Limited is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. Find out more on the Financial Services Register.
We are a division of Markel International, a Lloyd’s of London market insurer that wrote gross premium totals of £2.4bn in 2023.
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