Self-employed? Then YOU are responsible for insurance cover

In the excitement of buying a home, many contractors overlook the fact that they need insurance.

We don’t force you to take out any insurances with us. Likewise, we exclude any lenders who insist upon you taking out their policies from our list.

But that doesn’t mean you should ignore insurance, either life or Income protection.

As a permie, you may have had some sort of group life cover. As an employee, you’ll have had three months’ sick pay.

As a contractor, you get none of that, or at least for the time being. Moves are afoot to give agency workers similar rights to the hirer’s employees. Temps who’ve worked an assignment for more than twelve weeks will soon have the same rights as the client’s staff.

But that’s not the same as critical illness, relevant life or Income protection cover.

No one likes to think about dying. More than that, they begrudge paying premiums for a policy from which they’ll never benefit. Of course, once you’re dead, it’s your survivors who are the beneficiaries.

But as a limited company contractor, there’s is a less painful way to protect yourself.

If you pay the premiums through the company, the Revenue classes those payments as an expense. So you may not get the big benefit, but you can at least claim tax relief on the premiums.

This is an important topic; don’t leave it on the bottom of the to-do list. Our guides go into more depth and you should take ten minutes to familiarise yourself with this protocol.