Spring clean your clients’ business insurance: our top tips

Every year, your clients’ contract with their short-term insurance company is automatically renewed and sometimes, their business insurance contracts simply ‘ticks over’ without your having checked if the business has too much or too little cover in place.

Each year, the ombudsman for short-term insurance, Dennis Jooste, warns business owners to review their insurance policies. At Santam, we think getting your clients to ‘spring clean’ their business insurance policy will help them in the long run.

Adjust the amount their business contents is insured for

The main reason for reviewing your clients’ business insurance policy with them is to make sure that the business premises and the contents of their offices are insured for the right amount – that is, check that the ‘sum insured’ is correct. Over the course of the past year, your clients may have bought new equipment including laptops and a more enhanced telephony system all of which means they will need to adjust the all risks or electronic equipment section of their business insurance which means they may have needed to adjust their business insurance cover for inflation.

The business premises

If your clients have enhanced the value of their business premises by upgrading their offices or enhancing their security measures, you need to help them review the amount their building is insured for. The offices (its structure) as well as the office equipment (the contents of the office) must be insured for its replacement value that is, what it will cost your clients, at the time of a claim, to replace the building or equipment with similar, new structures or items.

Business vehicles

Business vehicles should be insured at a “reasonable market value”. Reasonable market value is the retail value, which is what a dealer would sell it for, considering its age, the mileage, the condition of the car and any extras such as a tracker. Direct your clients to Santam’s car calculator to help them work out the reasonable market value of their business vehicles.

Reasons to consider with Santam 

Santam is South Africa’s largest short-term insurer, insuring risks of over R4 trillion. We’ve paid out 99% of all claims made in the past year. We also offer the following cover and benefits:

• Comprehensive cover for businesses; and
• Standard excess for vehicles and buildings.

Santam also automatically increases a client’s business’ sum insured once a year on renewal on the Fire Section, Buildings and Office Contents with 10% to ensure we keep track of inflation.

For more advice and tools to grow your business visit our intermediary advice page.