If you are running a domestic cleaning business or considering starting your own cleaning company, domestic cleaning insurance is essential if you are to run your business honestly and legally. In a sector that is unregulated, there are many individuals working illegally, performing cleaning services for cash in hand payment, which puts not only cleaners, but customers at risk.
Read on to learn more about why insurance is important for domestic cleaning services, what kind of insurance is required and what this covers.
Insurance protects Cleaning Companies and Employees against liability
To operate a domestic cleaning company legally, it is required that you have employer’s liability insurance in order to protect any staff that you employ. House cleaning exposes employees to a range of liabilities, and the employer is required to ensure they are insured.
As a domestic cleaner, the role of your company is to enter into the homes of customers in order to carry out a range of cleaning tasks. These duties carry a range of risks for the customer’s property being damaged or lost via accident, so insurance is essential to protect cleaning companies in the event of such an issue.
As many property owners will be away from their home at the time that domestic cleaners attend, it is required to provide access to the property. As a result, this means that cleaners are liable for replacing keys or repairing locks in the event that they are lost or damaged. Cleaning insurance is important for covering any related costs should keys be lost or broken.
In addition to the risk of loss or damaged keys, cleaners are also expected to ensure a property is properly locked up when they leave. Needless to say, if a property was to be left unlocked and was damaged or burgled, this would result in a large bill for the cleaning company. Insurance is essential to protect cleaning companies against this.
As domestic cleaning will often mean moving different objects around in order to clean, or in some cases, cleaning tasks might require some vigorous attention, there are times when expensive or fragile property may be damaged. It could even be that a cleaner is blamed for damaging an item that was already damaged. Insurance keeps cleaning companies and employees protected in the event of damage to property.
Public Liability Insurance for Domestic Cleaning
Whilst public liability is not a legal obligation, it is very important. If cleaning work carried out by your company results in injury to a member of the public, insurance provides compensation to protect you.
Domestic Cleaning Insurance for Joining a Cleaning Trade Association
If you are seeking to join a cleaning trade association, then it’s important to look at what type of insurance they require members to have. Domestic cleaning trade associations not only provide a range of benefits to domestic cleaning companies and professionals, they also offer peace of mind to members of the public who seek cleaning services from members. By seeing that a cleaning company is a cleaning trade association member, they can be confident that the company is fully insured.
The Domestic Cleaning Alliance is part of the British Cleaning Council, representing professional domestic cleaning companies. Members are required to have full domestic cleaning insurance, including public liability insurance.