Ask the expert

The sums insured amounts for your practice should represent the full value of your contents at today’s prices. If this value is insufficient, your insurance provider is correct in saying this could affect the amount you receive in the event of a claim. This is because you are only insuring (and therefore paying the premium) for a percentage of the true value at risk. e.g. the real value of your contents is £10,000, you are insured for £7,500 which means you are only insuring for 75% of the risk. The Insurance provider, based on this example, could only pay 75% of any claim amount submitted (because they only insure that proportion of the risk).

The best way round this is to regularly check the values of the practice contents (best done around the time of your renewal), paying particular attention to any items purchased or disposed of.

Further in-depth information on reviewing your sums insured and understanding under-insurance can be found here “Are you properly protected?” and “Understanding under-insurance”.

A good provider, will not necessarily be the cheapest but should be able to offer you a quality, specialist service and look after your policy from start to finish, including underwriting and dealing with claims. As part of their professional service, they should fully understand your business and specialist equipment/premises as well as having expert knowledge of your particular needs.

Due to the complexities of your business and the niche insurance protection needed, a dedicated insurance provider for medical surgeries is paramount. Choosing a non-specialist broker who does not have this expert knowledge could lead to you not receiving the best advice and therefore the best protection for your practice. The last thing you want in the event of a claim is to discover your policy is designed for offices not surgeries and therefore your equipment or vaccines/drugs are not covered as well as they should be.

Business interruption cover applies when a loss occurs resulting in you not being able to use your premises to deliver services to your patients. The main reason for premises closure is probably fire, but it could also arise from storm damage, water damage, vehicle impact, a terrorist incident or contagious disease outbreak. Your premises could also be closed if a building near it was damaged or affected by any of these causes.

Business interruption cover is designed to put your business back in the same financial position it was in before a loss occurs. It provides protection against a reduction in gross income during the period you couldn’t deliver services to your patients. It’s important to choose an accurate financial amount that could make up for the reduction in gross income during the time it would take to reopen your premises or set up in alternative accommodation. Alongside this, it’s vital you make sure you are covered for the right length of time, for example, if you think it would take two years to rebuild your premises you should have insurance which provides you with adequate protection over the whole 24 month period.

Locum insurance is primarily designed to cover the cost of hiring a locum should you or another GP be absent through either illness or accident for any length of time. It will help ease the financial burden on both the GPs and the practice, knowing that you will receive a financial benefit to enable you to cover these usually significant and unexpected costs.

Some practices believe that rather than pay a monthly or yearly premium they can use the practice contingency fund to pay these costs, but over several months and with the possibility of more than one GP absent at the same time, this would seriously eat into the partnership profits.

If you are vacating all or part of your premises it is vital that you notify your insurance provider. They must be told because insurance cover is usually restricted if the building is unoccupied. An insurer will probably not provide cover for damage due to escape of water, riot and civil commotion, theft, malicious persons and accidental damage whilst premises are unoccupied. Many years claims experience has shown that unoccupied properties are far more vulnerable to damage and so pose an increased risk. Because of this increased risk, your insurer may ask for an increased premium but it would certainly cost you more if you needed to claim and hadn’t told your insurer, as it is likely the claim would be partly or fully declined. Or worse, your policy could become void. Any change to your practice buildings or contents may affect your insurance requirements so please make sure you discuss any changes with your provider.

Whether or not such incidents of theft are covered under your insurance policy will depend on the wording. I would always recommend that a surgery purchases a policy that includes what is known as full theft cover. This means that the sort of loss you have suffered would be covered. Unfortunately many of the package insurance policies on offer to surgeries at cheap premiums restrict theft cover so that there has to be evidence of violent and visible entrance to or exit from the premises. This means the insurance won’t provide cover against thieves walking in and stealing things whilst a practice is open. Whilst price is important, you need to be aware of what you are buying as not all surgery insurance packages offer the same levels of cover.

No matter how long you have been in practice or how rigorous your clinical procedures are, the threat of an allegation or complaint against you is always present.

In 2006 the General Dental Council received 3,196 reports in the UK on issues ranging from poor practice management through to drug abuse. 414 cases were forwarded to Fitness to Practice procedures, of which 107 dentists were referred to the Professional Conduct Committee for a public enquiry.

The same year, the General Medical Council conducted 303 Fitness to Practice hearings. The number of doctors who were the subject of an Enquiry to the GMC rose by over 29% in the five years between 2002 and 2007.

When a suspension is imposed patients are left facing delays, or being without treatment. Re-booking appointments is one option if the suspension is short; for longer periods your practice may choose to cover the workload itself using other partners or recruiting a replacement.

So what can you do to protect your income against such threats? Suspension insurance is a practical solution helping to pay for the additional costs incurred by you or the practice to maintain patient treatment while a disciplinary investigation is pending.

The cover works in a similar way to normal personal accident and sickness claims. An excess period applies (initially selected when starting cover and reviewable throughout the life of the policy). Cover is provided during the remaining suspension period until either a suspension decision is finalised and you return to work or face permanent disciplinary measures, or until the policy benefit period expires.

Unfortunately, yes. You can be sued via something called Vicarious Liability. Vicarious liability is defined as the liability of one person for torts committed by another person. A tort is a civil wrong, in other words, an act committed by someone that could result in them having some form of liability to another because of negligence, trespass, nuisance, defamation, or breach of privacy for example. The liability is dependant on the relationship between the two individuals so, in order to make you vicariously liable a worker must:

• Be your employee
• Have committed tort in the course of their employment

Importantly, as the employer, you may be found liable in addition to the employee. So, the claimant can sue you as an employer (vicarious liability), your employee (prime liability) or both of you (joint liability). As an employer you are vicariously liable for negligent acts or omissions by your employees in the course of employment, irrespective of whether or not the act or omission was specifically authorised by you. To avoid vicarious liability, you must demonstrate either that your employee was not negligent (i.e. the employee was reasonably careful) or that your employee was acting in his own right rather than on your business.