Home insurance

[Gill Brownsword]

I'm looking to change my home insurance cover. I thought this would be easy but I need tenants insurance from a company that covers childminders. Does such a thing exist??? I'm planning on joining PACEY and looked at Blue fin but they only seem to offer Buildings and contents and I don't want to violate my contract with my landlord.
Thanks for any advice

[Sammy Jo T]

I'm looking to change my home insurance cover. I thought this would be easy but I need tenants insurance from a company that covers childminders. Does such a thing exist??? I'm planning on joining PACEY and looked at Blue fin but they only seem to offer Buildings and contents and I don't want to violate my contract with my landlord.
Thanks for any advice

You just need a normal contents insurance and advise them you childmind from home. Most companies will cover this as long as they have been informed, they may need to add an endorsement to your policy limiting your number of business visitors per week (usually 15).

My advice would be do your quotes online and save them (You usually get the best deals this way) then when you have the best one ring them to accept it over the phone and they will be able to add any necessary endorsements to the policy.

I worked for RBS insurance for 7 years and most of their Insurance brands work on this basis. I can tell you for a fact Direct Line still operate these terms as I'm with them and rang today to double check this policy still applied and it does.

Make sure you're landlord agrees to you childminding also so it doesn't breech your contract.

I hope that helps and you get a policy you're happy with.

[Claire1976]

You just need a normal contents insurance and advise them you childmind from home. Most companies will cover this as long as they have been informed, they may need to add an endorsement to your policy limiting your number of business visitors per week (usually 15).

My advice would be do your quotes online and save them (You usually get the best deals this way) then when you have the best one ring them to accept it over the phone and they will be able to add any necessary endorsements to the policy.

I worked for RBS insurance for 7 years and most of their Insurance brands work on this basis. I can tell you for a fact Direct Line still operate these terms as I'm with them and rang today to double check this policy still applied and it does.

Make sure you're landlord agrees to you childminding also so it doesn't breech your contract.

I hope that helps and you get a policy you're happy with.

I second what Sammy Jo has said about Direct Line. I too used to work for RBS insurance and Direct Line in the Home insurance IT department (I left last year). You just need to tell them you are childminding and they'll flag it on your policy. It shouldn't make any difference to your premium (unless things have changed in the last year!).

[rickysmiths]

Interesting. In 20 years of cm I have never been made aware of any limit whatsoever on the number of 'business visitors' a week.

If this is the case, and I am with direct line at the moment and they have never advised me of this, I will have to check.

This is quite serious because who do they count as 'business visitors'?

Is it the individual children attending your setting per week? Many childminders have many more than 15 children through the course of a week.

Is it the parents of the children and any prospective parents who visit? If so again if both parents come to drop off and collect that is already '20' visits a week just for one full time child.

I normally have 3 full time and 2 before and after school so that is 50 separate adult business visitors and 25 child visitors through the week. Plus any visits by Prospective families, ofsted, Country EY people, College Assessors if a cm is doing a L3, visiting cm friends and so on. This is well in excess of 15 and all are justified 'Business' visitors.

Can you please clarify Sammy Jo T because this is very very concerning.

I will definitely be contacting Direct Line on Monday.

[natlou82]

Rickysmiths, can you remember a previous thread where I mentioned I had problems with home insurance and ended up opting for blue fin? It was for this very reason I found difficulties - it's worth checking out.

[Simona]

I'm looking to change my home insurance cover. I thought this would be easy but I need tenants insurance from a company that covers childminders. Does such a thing exist??? I'm planning on joining PACEY and looked at Blue fin but they only seem to offer Buildings and contents and I don't want to violate my contract with my landlord.
Thanks for any advice

Gill....I have been with Bluefin for years and find they are good....call them and ask to speak to the broker who looks after your policy.
I know of cms who rent and have no problem with insurance because the landlord has ah agreement with the cm.
any policy will have to include 'accidental damage'...which in turn is probably covered by your agreement with the landlord?


I too am puzzled by the 'limit to business visitors' posted below...is this insurance going to limit the number of new potential clients ie 'parents' or is this about people entering our setting in any shape or form?
Would be great to have this explained

[Sammy Jo T]

Was having a think over the weekend about when I used to note childminding on people's policies and I thought I'm sure there was something else I used to advise and what Ricky said got me thinking, so just double checked and the 15 people doesn't apply to the DL policies and most likely won't be to Churchill either so my apologies if I got anyone worried.

You do still need to advise them that you are childminding so they can add business use in the home to your policy but as Claire said it shouldn't affect your premium. Just make sure you do get your separate liability insurance as this won't be covered by your home cover.

[Gill Brownsword]

Thank you so much all of you! I was worried as some policies have said visitors to home etc and with just starting out I have no idea what the number would be! My landlord is great and wrote a letter for my file to confirm that I'm ok. His only requirement is that I have tenants insurance, I want to change companies as my old one was expensive and covered nothing!

I think I'll call direct line and Blue fin and see what quotes they give me