Mickey Clayton Insurance

Business Coverage

Small Busi­ness Insur­ance to the Largest of Corporations

The suc­cess of a busi­ness, whether it’s a tiny enter­prise run out of a base­ment or a large cor­po­ra­tion, is largely depen­dent on hard work and inge­nu­ity. How­ever, no mat­ter how indus­tri­ous the busi­ness owner, one sim­ple mishap such as a hur­ri­cane or law­suit can wipe out all the prof­its and even destroy the busi­ness. The key to mak­ing sure that all the effort and money invested in a busi­ness doesn’t dis­ap­pear when a dis­as­ter strikes is to pro­tect a busi­ness with the appro­pri­ate insurance.

Find the right agent

  • Ask friends and acquain­tances who are in the same kind of busi­ness about their agent.
  • Ask the agent or com­pany that pro­vides your per­sonal insur­ance for advice.
  • Search busi­ness trade asso­ci­a­tions to see if they spon­sor an insur­ance pro­gram spe­cific to your business.
  • Make sure the insur­ance agent is knowl­edge­able about your business’s par­tic­u­lar insur­ance needs and meth­ods to reduce expo­sure to loss.

File a claim

  • When a fire, acci­dent or theft occurs, your insur­ance agent and com­pany should be con­tacted at once. Any bur­glar­ies or theft should be reported to the police immediately.
  • After a dis­as­ter, take steps to pro­tect the prop­erty from fur­ther dam­age with tem­po­rary repairs.
  • If imme­di­ate repairs to equip­ment are nec­es­sary, save the dam­aged parts in case the claims adjuster is inter­ested in exam­in­ing them.
  • Get at least two bids on the cost to repair or replace dam­aged property.
  • When fil­ing a busi­ness inter­rup­tion claim, you should be able to show the income from the busi­ness both before and after the loss.
  • Keep detailed records of busi­ness activ­ity and extra expenses dur­ing the inter­rup­tion period. This should include expenses that con­tinue dur­ing the time that the busi­ness is closed such as adver­tis­ing, tele­phone, etc.

Save money

  • Keep in close touch with your agent to:
    1. Under­stand how your pre­mium is being determined.
    2. Inform your agent of the steps you are tak­ing to pre­vent loss.
  • Make arrange­ments to use the facil­i­ties of another firm in the same line of work in case there is an inter­rup­tion period.
  • Store a backup of your elec­tronic records off the premises.
  • Take a higher deductible on your pol­icy. It will result in a reduced premium.
  • Buy a pack­age pol­icy rather than sep­a­rate poli­cies. Pack­age poli­cies often pro­vide broader cov­er­age at a lower price.
  • Con­sider installing igni­tion cut­off sys­tems, alarms or hood and wheel-locking devices in com­pany cars. Some insur­ance com­pa­nies offer dis­counts for these items.
  • Dis­cuss insur­ance with peo­ple in the same busi­ness. You may pick up trends in price and other devel­op­ments which can save money.
  • Involve employ­ees in all pro­grams to pre­vent loss and main­tain safety.

Insure against catastrophe

Busi­nesses that recover quickly are those that plan in advance. This involves not only pur­chas­ing the right insur­ance, but also devel­op­ing and main­tain­ing an ade­quate recov­ery plan.

1. Min­i­mize the risk of dam­age in advance of an emergency:

  • Train employ­ees in fire safety par­tic­u­larly those respon­si­ble for stor­age areas, house­keep­ing, main­te­nance and oper­a­tions where open flames or flam­ma­ble sub­stances are used.
  • Mod­ern­ize the elec­tri­cal sys­tem since faulty wiring causes a large per­cent­age of non­res­i­den­tial fires.
  • Sit­u­ate your busi­ness in a fire-resistive build­ing — a struc­ture made of non-combustible mate­ri­als with fire­walls that cre­ate bar­ri­ers to the spread of fires — and in a build­ing with a fire alarm sys­tem con­nected to the local fire department.
  • Limit storm-related dam­age by mak­ing sure the build­ing con­forms to damage-resistant build­ing codes.

2. Develop a dis­as­ter recover plan:

  • Keep dupli­cate records of both com­put­er­ized and writ­ten records. Under fed­eral law, if com­pa­nies fail to main­tain accu­rate busi­ness records and to safe­guard those records, the com­pany may be held liable.
  • In order to main­tain mar­ket share while the busi­ness is closed for repairs, iden­tify the crit­i­cal busi­ness activ­i­ties and the resources needed to sup­port them.
  • Plan for the worst pos­si­ble sce­nario. Do research before a dis­as­ter strikes by find­ing alter­na­tive facil­i­ties, equip­ment and sup­plies and locat­ing qual­i­fied contractors.
  • Set up an emer­gency response plan and train employ­ees how to carry it out. Con­sider the things you may need to ini­tial­ize dur­ing an emer­gency such as back-up sources of power and com­mu­ni­ca­tions sys­tems. Also, con­sider the sup­plies that may be needed such as first-aid kits and flashlights.
  • Com­pile a list of impor­tant phone num­bers and addresses includ­ing local and state emer­gency man­age­ment agen­cies, major clients, con­trac­tors, sup­pli­ers, real­tors, finan­cial insti­tu­tions, insur­ance agents and claims rep­re­sen­ta­tives. The list should also include employ­ees and com­pany offi­cials. Keep copies off the premises in case the dis­as­ter is widespread.
  • Decide on a com­mu­ni­ca­tions strat­egy to pre­vent loss of clients/customers. It is imper­a­tive for clients and cus­tomers to know how to con­tact your com­pany at its new loca­tion. Among the pos­si­bil­i­ties to explore, depend­ing on the cir­cum­stances, are post­ing notices out­side the orig­i­nal premises, con­tact­ing clients by phone or mail, plac­ing a notice in local news­pa­pers and ask­ing friends and acquain­tances in the local busi­ness com­mu­nity to help dis­sem­i­nate the information.

3. Review your Insur­ance Program:

For Prop­erty -

  • Typ­i­cally, prop­erty insur­ance poli­cies exclude cov­er­age for flood dam­age. If your busi­ness is located in a flood zone, you will prob­a­bly need to buy a flood insur­ance pol­icy through the National Flood Insur­ance Program.
  • The fed­eral gov­ern­ment requires build­ings in flood zones that don’t con­form to flood plain build­ing codes be torn down if dam­age exceeds 50 per­cent of the mar­ket value. Con­sider pur­chas­ing ordi­nance or law cov­er­age to help pay for the extra costs of tear­ing down the struc­ture and rebuild­ing it, whether dam­aged by flood or some­thing else.
  • If your pol­icy con­tains a coin­sur­ance clause, make sure your prop­erty is suf­fi­ciently insured in com­pli­ance with the clause. Ask your agent for help!

For Busi­ness Inter­rup­tion -

  • Busi­ness inter­rup­tion insur­ance com­pen­sates for income lost if your com­pany has to vacate the premises or is unable to oper­ate at the same loca­tion due to a cov­ered loss.
  • Busi­ness inter­rup­tion insur­ance cov­ers the prof­its you would have earned, based on your finan­cial records, had the loss not occurred.
  • The pol­icy cov­ers oper­at­ing expenses that con­tinue, like elec­tric­ity, or a mort­gage pay­ment even though busi­ness activ­i­ties have come to a tem­po­rary halt.
  • Make sure the pol­icy lim­its are suf­fi­cient to cover your com­pany for the amount of time you are shut down.
  • The price of the pol­icy is related to the risk of a fire or other dis­as­ter dam­ag­ing your premises.

For Extra Expenses -

  • Extra expense insur­ance reim­burses your com­pany for a rea­son­able sum of money that it spends, over and above nor­mal oper­at­ing expenses, to avoid hav­ing to shut down dur­ing the restora­tion period.
  • Usu­ally extra expense insur­ance will only be paid if the extra expenses help to decrease busi­ness inter­rup­tion costs.
  • In some instances, extra expense insur­ance alone may pro­vide suf­fi­cient cov­er­age, with­out the pur­chase of busi­ness inter­rup­tion insurance.

ON A REGULAR BASIS, REVIEW ALL THE COMPONENTS OF THE DISASTER RECOVERY PLAN:

  1. Fire safety and emer­gency pre­pared­ness measures.
  2. Busi­ness con­tin­u­a­tion and build­ing repair plans.
  3. Insur­ance program.

COMMUNICATE CHANGES TO KEY EMPLOYEES.

CONTACT YOUR INSURANCE AGENT OR THE INSURANCE COMPANY’S LOSS CONTROL SERVICES IF YOU NEED HELP IN IDENTIFYING HAZARDS AND ASSESSING RISK OR FOR MORE INFORMATION ON DEVELOPING A DISASTER RECOVERY PLAN.

For a quote please call 602–242-2512 or Click here to apply now for a quote