Home bakery insurance

Public liability insurance

In case your baking business and products cause injuries or property damage.

What’s typically covered by public liability insurance for home bakers?

Claims against your business for:

• damage to someone’s property, because of your home baking business
• an injury or illness caused by your business activities or products
• accidental damage or injuries caused by your employees

If you do employ anyone, you’re usually required by law to have employers’ liability insurance too.

For example:

• you stain a client’s clothes when they come to pick up their order
• some pastries you’ve prepared for a client’s team meeting cause a case of food poisoning
• a client cuts their finger on a crate containing their order

Read more about public liability insurance

Employers’ liability insurance

In case anyone gets ill or injured while working for your home baking business.

What’s typically covered by employers’ liability insurance?

Claims against your business for:

• an injury or illness that happens as a result of working for you (including temps and casual workers)

**Employers’ liability insurance is required by law if you have people working for you. Without it, you could be fined up to £2,500 a day for each employee.**

For example:

• your Christmas temp burns themselves while taking a tray of biscuits out of the oven
• one of your team slips on the wet kitchen floor, breaking their arm

Tools insurance

In case something happens to your baking kit.

What’s typically covered by tools insurance?

• the specialist tools you use for baking, like handheld or portable electronic equipment
• loss, damage or theft

For example:

• you drop and smash a set of piping tools
• your employee breaks part of your mixer while cleaning down for the day

Read more about tools insurance

Stock insurance

In case something happens to your ingredients or materials.

What’s typically covered by stock insurance for home bakers?

• loss, damage or theft of things like your fresh ingredients, specialist flours or packaging materials

For example:

• your stock of exotic fruit, prepped coulis and other ingredients go bad, due to a faulty freezer
• a fire destroys your pantry, including a recent bulk order of specialist flours, spices and other dried goods

Read more about stock insurance

Business and office equipment insurance

In case something happens to the equipment you use to run your business.

What’s typically covered by business equipment insurance?

• theft of the equipment you use to operate as a home baker, from your laptop to your new blender
• loss of your equipment
• flood, fire or accidental damage

For example:

• a flood in your kitchen damages essential appliances and equipment, including a freezer
• while preparing ingredients, your temp breaks an expensive food processor, delaying orders for the next day

Read more about business and office equipment insurance

Legal expenses insurance

In case you have to pay legal costs while running your home baking business.

What’s typically covered by legal expenses insurance?

• legal costs associated with day-to-day operations, like an employee dispute
• property damage, nuisance or trespass and associated legal costs
• HMRC, tax and compliance issues, if they come up
• includes a tax advice helpline, a 24/7 confidential legal helpline and crisis support to help you protect your reputation, as a popular home bake

For example:

• your client is refusing to pay the balance for an order, and you need to raise a legal case
• a temp you’ve hired for the busy Christmas season brings an employment case against you

Read more about legal expenses insurance

Personal accident insurance

In case you or anyone you’ve covered has an accident – at work, or elsewhere.

What’s typically covered by personal accident insurance?

• injury or death of anyone you’ve chosen to cover in your policy – whether this happens at work or elsewhere
• lost income, hospital bills or other medical costs associated with the accident

For example:

• you break a finger while playing football with the kids, keeping you off work for two weeks
• a temp you’ve covered catches their hand in one of your mixers, causing a serious injury

Read more about personal accident insurance

Can I just cover my most expensive tools?

Make sure you cover the total cost of replacing all your tools or you’ll only get a proportion of your claim paid out if something happens to them. Learn about tool cover.

Which type of workers do I need insurance for?

Employers’ liability insurance is a legal requirement if you employ people.

If you have people working for you, including bona fide subcontractors (BFSC), labour-only subcontractors (LOSC), part-timers, or full-time staff, employers’ liability insurance is required by law.

Read on for our simplified guide to the difference between labour-only subcontractors and bona fide subcontractors.

Will tools insurance cover all my equipment?

Depending on what you use to do your work, you may need other covers.

You may need more than tools insurance – for example, business equipment insurance if you have a work laptop, plant insurance if you use machinery.

Does home bakery insurance cover my work correctly?

Make sure you’re picking the right cover to protect you properly. It’s important to know that if you have another trade or job, you’ll need additional cover. For example, do you need to consider private tutor insurance or private chef insurance ?

Do I need cover for other types of work?

If you provide other services, make sure you’re covered:

• Cake business insurance
• Bakery insurance
• Catering insurance
• Sandwich shop insurance
• Coffee shop insurance
• Cafe insurance
• Restaurant insurance
• Craft insurance

Other types of insurance

• Limited company insurance
• Self-employed insurance
• Freelance insurance
• Consultant insurance
• Contractors insurance
• Sole trader insurance

Which public liability cover limit should I choose?

Think about the maximum possible loss your business could face in the event of a claim, and make sure you take legal fees and damages into consideration. You can choose from three levels of coverage – £1 million, £2 million, or up to £5 million.