Business insurance for Painters and decorators


You select high quality paint with great coverage for your clients’ wall. With Hiscox you can get the same for your painter and decorator business with insurance tailored to your trade. 

You’re always precise with your brushes, paint and ladders. But public liability insurance for painters and decorators can step in when things go awry. Say paint is spilled on a carpet. Or your client slips on your dustsheets. 

If you make your living painting people’s houses, decorators’ insurance can help.

 

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Why choose Hiscox for your painter and decorator insurance?


1

Tailored cover 

Only pay for what you need with Hiscox. Tailor insurance to your painter and decorator business.

2

Public liability up to £10 million

Your work with the public comes with risk, so liability insurance for painters and decorators can help cover you for legal costs up to £10 million. 

3

Award-winning experts

We've been proud winners of the Feefo Platinum Trusted Service award for many years. 

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Why do painters and decorators need insurance?


Paint spills

Being a professional means providing an accurate and quality service. But accidents can be unavoidable, especially when you’re working in unfamiliar environments. While decorating a private house, you lay dust sheets and do all the prep work. However, when you miss a step holding a freshly opened tin of paint, you miss the sheets and spill across the client’s carpet. 

Decorators’ public liability insurance can help with compensation or legal costs if a client says your work has damaged their property or caused them injury.

Employee accident

When painting a ceiling at height, one of your employees falls off a ladder and breaks their leg. Their injury puts them in hospital and leaves them unable to work for a number of weeks. The employee accuses you of failing to take appropriate safety precautions and launches legal action. 

Employers’ liability insurance could offer protection in such cases. This type of cover may assist with handling your legal and compensation expenses.

Specialist equipment

When you sign a new commercial contract, you need all your equipment to get started. However, when moving between jobs with your painters and apprentices, things can become busy and items can be misplaced. A kit box full of essential rollers, trays, extension poles and brushes gets lost. Without sourcing quick replacements, you could be set back from hitting deadlines. 

Property away and in transit insurance can be a helpful product for a painter and decorator. Sometimes called tool insurance, it could assist with quickly replacing kit that’s lost, stolen or damaged when you’re out and about.

What insurance is available for painters and decorators?


Painters and decorators may choose to add other types of cover to their business policy too, such as cyber and data cover and legal protection insurance.

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Insurance for painters and decorators: FAQs


How much is insurance for a painter?

How much insurance costs for a painter and decorator will depend on several factors. These will include the size of your business – whether you’re self-employed or have a team of decorators. 

The overall cost of your policy will also depend on where you work and how many types of business insurance you add. Having a suitable level of cover and setting appropriate cover limits can be key, as underinsurance can leave you needing to foot the bill in the event of a claim. 

At Hiscox, insurance for painters and decorators starts at £8.40*. 

*Figures based on an average of all business insurance policies sold to at least 10% of our customer base between January 2023 and January 2024

Do I need insurance if I’m a self-employed painter and decorator?

While insurance isn’t legally required for a self-employed painter and decorator, you may find a need for it. For instance, decorators working alone may find the financial impact of a public liability claim difficult to cover, or recover from, without insurance. 

Cover for tools can prove helpful too. Meanwhile, if you take bookings and communicate with clients digitally, protecting your business with cyber and data cover could also help you bounce back from unexpected breaches.

Will tools insurance cover all my equipment?

Tools insurance can help you with the cost of repairs or replacements of your essential decorating equipment if it’s lost, stolen or damaged. 

However, tool insurance doesn’t account for mechanical or electrical failure. So if your electric paint sprayer or heat gun experiences an electrical malfunction, equipment breakdown insurance can step in.

Is there a law for house painters to have public liability insurance?

While there isn’t a legal requirement for house painters and decorators to purchase public liability insurance, many tradespeople choose to take it out. If while painting you damage property or injure a member of the public, public liability insurance could provide financial support should you have to pay compensation and/or legal costs. 

Also, before appointing a business for a job, your client may require a minimum level of public liability insurance as a condition of the contract.