Hospitality Insurance
Cover for businesses that feed people, serve them drinks or put them up for the night, where the public is on your premises and most of the risk arrives with them.
What Makes Hospitality Different
Hospitality is rated differently from almost every other sector, and for three reasons that apply whether you run a village pub or a forty cover restaurant. You have the public on your premises, which makes liability a live exposure rather than a theoretical one. You cook, which makes fire the single largest property risk you carry. And you serve alcohol or trade late, which changes how insurers view the whole account.
That is why a general commercial policy usually fits a hospitality business badly. The covers are the same words; the conditions attached to them are not.
The Cover Most Of These Businesses Need
Public liability
The cover every hospitality contract and licence conversation starts with. Slips on a wet floor, injury from furniture or fittings, and in a food business, illness traced back to what you served. Usually £5 million, with some landlords and local authorities asking for £10 million.
Employers' liability
Compulsory once you have anybody working for you, including casual and seasonal staff. Hospitality runs on part timers and agency cover, and all of them count.
Buildings, contents and stock
The fit out, the kitchen equipment, and the stock. Where you lease, the lease usually makes the tenant responsible for the fit out and often for the glass, whatever the landlord insures.
Business interruption
The one that decides whether the business survives a fire. A kitchen fire closes the premises for months, and the indemnity period has to cover rebuilding, refitting and getting the customers back.
Deterioration of stock
Frozen and chilled stock lost when refrigeration fails or the power goes. Small sums, frequently claimed, and routinely left off a policy written by somebody who does not know the sector.
Money and assault
Cash on the premises in and out of hours, in transit to the bank, with personal assault cover for staff. Late trading and cash takings make this a real section rather than a formality.
Fire Is The Claim That Closes Hospitality Businesses
Across the sector, cooking equipment is the largest single cause of serious loss, and insurers price and condition the whole account around it. Ducting and extraction carry the most weight, because grease build up in a duct turns a contained fryer fire into a building fire.
Expect conditions rather than suggestions. Most insurers now require extraction ducting to be professionally cleaned at a stated frequency, with certificates retained, and will ask about fire suppression over the cooking line. Deep fat fryers usually need a thermostat and a high limit cut out. A fire claim where the cleaning certificates cannot be produced is a difficult claim, and the condition is the cheapest thing on the policy to comply with.
If you have changed the kitchen, added a fryer, or started doing food where you previously did not, that is a conversation at the time rather than at renewal. A pub that quietly became a restaurant is a materially different risk.
Late Hours And Alcohol Change The Whole Account
Insurers rate licensed premises on closing time more than almost anything else. Trading past midnight moves an account; trading past two in the morning moves it a great deal further, and a handful of insurers will not write it at all.
What they are pricing is not the drink, it is what happens around closing. Assault claims, door staff, glass, and damage caused by people leaving. Where you use door supervisors, insurers will want to know they are SIA licensed and whether they are your employees or supplied under contract, because that decides whose liability answers an incident at the door.
CCTV, a documented incident log and a Challenge 25 policy are all things underwriters ask about, and all three make a difference to terms. They are also the evidence that defends a claim, which matters more.
What Your Lease Makes You Responsible For
Most hospitality businesses lease rather than own, and the lease rather than the policy decides what you have to insure. It is worth reading before you buy cover rather than after a loss.
The common pattern is that the landlord insures the structure and recharges you through the service charge, while the tenant is responsible for the fit out, the glass, and anything they installed. Kitchen extraction, bar fittings, cold rooms and signage are usually tenant's improvements even though they are physically part of the building.
Two things go wrong repeatedly. Tenants insure the fit out at what it cost rather than what replacing it costs today, which after the last few years is a material gap. And tenants assume the landlord's buildings policy will get them trading again, when it will rebuild the shell and nothing else.
What Moves The Price
- What you cook, and what you cook it on
- Closing time, and whether you trade past midnight
- Whether alcohol is served, and the share of wet trade
- Sums insured on the fit out, stock and gross profit
- Extraction cleaning, fire suppression and alarm specification
- Claims history, which in hospitality is looked at closely
We are a broker, so we take it to several insurers rather than quoting one. Call 02382 000820 for a realistic figure.
Pubs, bars and hotels
Licensed premises, where the licence and the hours drive the rating.
Pub insurance
Wet led and food led pubs, including gardens, letting rooms and live entertainment.
Restaurant insurance
Kitchens, covers and the fire conditions that follow from both.
Hotel insurance
Guests sleeping on the premises, which changes the liability and the fire position.
Wine bar insurance
Stock values, glass, and late hours without a full kitchen.
Nightclub insurance
Late licences, door staff and the capacity questions underwriters ask first.
Takeaways
High fire load, long hours, and delivery exposure the main policy rarely covers.
Fish and chip shops
Frying ranges, ducting and the cleaning records insurers now ask to see.
Chinese takeaways
Wok burners, extraction and late trading.
Indian takeaways
Tandoors, which insurers treat as a risk of their own.
Pizza shops
Ovens, delivery riders and the motor exposure that comes with them.
Kebab shops
Vertical grills, late hours and a higher share of walk in trade.
Leisure
Where people come to do something rather than to eat.
Cover that often goes with this
The gaps we most often find sitting next to this policy.
- Public liabilityThe cover every licence and lease conversation starts with.
- Business interruptionSetting an indemnity period that survives a kitchen fire.
- Guide: hospitality insuranceThe longer read, if you want the background rather than a quote.
- Talk to a brokerTell us what you serve and until when, and we will price it properly.
Common questions
What insurance does a hospitality business need?+
Employers' liability is the only one required by law once you have staff. Public liability is required by essentially every lease and licence conversation, usually at £5 million. Beyond those two, a hospitality policy normally carries buildings or tenant's improvements, contents and stock, business interruption, deterioration of stock, money and glass. Which of those matter most depends on whether you own or lease and how much of your value sits in the kitchen.
Why is hospitality insurance more expensive than other commercial cover?+
Three things drive it. The public is on your premises, which makes liability claims frequent rather than rare. You cook, and cooking equipment is the largest single cause of serious fire loss in the sector. And if you serve alcohol or trade late, the claims that happen around closing time get priced in. A business doing none of those three would be rated very differently.
Do insurers really require extraction ducting to be cleaned?+
On most hospitality wordings, yes, at a stated frequency and with certificates retained. Grease build up in ducting is what turns a contained cooking fire into a building fire, so insurers treat it as a condition rather than advice. Keep the certificates, because a fire claim without them is a much harder conversation.
Does my landlord's insurance cover my restaurant?+
It usually covers the structure and not much that matters to you. The fit out, kitchen equipment, extraction, bar fittings, signage and stock are normally the tenant's responsibility, and so is the glass on many leases. The landlord's policy would rebuild the shell; it would not replace your kitchen or pay you while you are shut.
How long should business interruption cover run for a hospitality business?+
Long enough to rebuild, refit and get the customers back, which is almost always longer than twelve months. A serious kitchen fire means stripping out, rebuilding, refitting and then rebuilding the trade, and a restaurant that reopens to an empty room has not recovered. Twenty four months is a more realistic starting point.
Do I need different cover if I start doing deliveries?+
Usually yes. Delivery riders and drivers bring a motor exposure that a premises policy does not cover, and whether they are employed or self employed changes who is liable. Tell us before you start, because it is a change to the risk rather than an administrative detail.
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