Saturday, 23 July 2011

A-Z of Selling Your Handmade Jewellery / Selling Your Handmade Silver Jewellery

This week's letter in the A- Z of Selling your Handmade Jewellery / Handmade Silver Jewellery is
I for Insurance
If a craftsperson is undertaking fairs /exhibitions etc then the minimum insurance they will need is public liability insurance. Supposing a customer were to trip over your draping table cloth and injure themselves - can you afford to pay out several thousand pounds in compensation? - and that's after the solicitor fees!!

For craftworkers, public liability insurance is reasonably inexpensive.  I had a policy last year which cost me approximately £55 and this included product liability (ie if my product injured someone).  An example of this perhaps would be if a post on a butterfly backed earring broke off in someone's ear.
Clearly I can't specifically recommend an insurer, however I can tell you who I have subsequently insured with (following an increase in premium by £20 in one year).  I've never needed to claim, so I don't know how good they are on paying out - but... I'm insured with £5 million public liability (compared to £1 million last year) and have public and product liability within the policy.

I discovered AIR - www.a-n.co.uk  for artists.  It's a membership organisation which automatically provides insurance when becoming a member.  Once you're a member, you can download the insurance documents.  The cost for being a member of AIR for me.... which incidentally is a great online resource and sends out magazines (either online or paperbased depending on your membership choice) was £30 the year!  You can also post details on the 'what's on' listings plus an image on the interface, as well as review and comments.  It covers craft workers - but double check if it covers you for specifics relating to your craft.  For example it doesn't cover 'hot works' when you're out exhibiting.

As I say, I can't recommend it - I can just say that it covers me for what I want and I found it extremely reasonable in price too..

No comments:

Post a Comment