"It's only a two-week job, we're not taking out separate insurance for this" – it gets said every day, and often rightly so. The honest picture isn't that every job needs a project CAR policy; it's that the decision should be made on the size of the potential loss, not the size of the job. This article offers some level-headed pointers for making it.
- Small job ≠ small risk: the loss tracks the value of the surroundings, not the total on the invoice.
- If there's a well-set-up annual open cover or a contractor's policy in place, small jobs are often protected under it too – once you've checked.
- Separate project cover is justified by exposure: an occupied building, an operating plant, substantial third-party property around the work site.
- For a private client, home insurance and tradespeople's liability insurance are the first line.
When is existing cover enough?
If the company has an annual open cover, a small job typically runs under it – the only question is whether it's been included under the notification rules, and whether the type of work fits the cover's profile. If all you have is contractor's liability insurance, that covers loss caused to others – not protection for your own work and materials: the relationship between the two genres. For plenty of small jobs, that's a risk worth taking – taken consciously.
When is separate cover justified?
There are three warning lights. One: the work takes place in a sensitive setting – an occupied building, an operating plant, a busy street; roof renovation and an operating office building are the two textbook cases. Two: your own exposure is high – valuable materials, plant or prefabricated elements are sitting on site. Three: the client or the tender requires it – in which case the question is settled, and the tender documentation prevails. If even one of the three applies, the cost of separate cover is typically dwarfed by the risk it covers.
The private client's perspective
For home renovation, the owner's first line isn't CAR, but their own home insurance (what it covers during the work, what needs to be reported) and tradespeople's liability insurance. For high-value, structural work, though – adding a storey, a full roof replacement – project cover comes into play there too. The owner's perspective gets its own article: renovation through the owner's eyes, with the residential-side detail living on the lakas.biz sister site.
The decision routine
For a small job, three questions, one minute: How big is the largest realistic loss (not the most likely – the largest)? Is there live cover for it already (an open cover, a contractor's policy, the client's policy)? And does anyone require a certificate? Anyone who runs through these three questions job by job doesn't spend needlessly – and doesn't end up uncovered where the stakes are high. In a borderline case, the two-minute self-check or a short consultation will quickly clear things up.
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