Public Liability
Insurance Brokers

As a business owner you are accountable to third parties that come into contact with your business – including customers, suppliers and anyone else who may be involved with your business. If damage or an accident occurs while you’re carrying out your business, the impacted person may take legal action against your business, which can result in costly legal fees as well as the obligation to pay for the damage or injury you may have caused.

If you work with clients or customers, in public spaces, visit spaces owned or controlled by others, have visitors to your premises, or manufacture products; public liability insurance can assist you against potentially costly personal injury or property damage claims.

Public liability insurance can cover your business for:

• Legal costs incurred in the defence or settlement of a covered claim
• Cover for others that may be acting on behalf of your business when the incident occurred
• Loss or damage of goods – which are in your care custody or control which you do not own
• Loss or damage of someone else’s property that occurs while performing your service
• Your first aid expenses at the time of an incident
• Costs incurred as a result of injury to others whilst visiting your premises

This is a summary only, the full details of what is and is not covered, please get in touch with us.

Things public liability doesn’t cover you for include:

• Your (the employer’s) responsibility for injured workers (this is covered through workers compensation insurance)
• Aircraft products
• Asbestos
• Punitive damages (damages awarded where a judge believes you acted so badly that extra damages are awarded)
• Gradual pollution
• Products recall

Every business is different, and there is no ‘one size fits all’ rule for how much public liability insurance your business needs. Sometimes the amount of public liability insurance you need will be dictated by the contracts you work on – for example, some corporate and government contracts will stipulate a minimum amount of public liability.

Ausguard offers multiple levels of public liability cover:

• $5 million
• $10 million
• $20 million

Public liability claims can be very costly, so it’s important you choose a level of cover that will financially protect your business should you need to make a claim.

Some examples of scenarios that might be covered under your public liability policy would be:

• If a third party slips and falls, injuring themselves in your premises
• If you manufacture and sell a product that you do not realise is defective and someone is injured as a result of the defect
• If your job is to paint houses and your ladder slips and breaks a window on the third party’s property

Public liability insurance doesn’t cover losses arising from you providing professional services or advice to clients.

Professional indemnity insurance protects you and your business from claims of financial loss arising from an act, error or omission in the performance of professional services.