Fecó is a painter and tiler – the kind of tradesman clients recommend to each other. Yet the risk in his trade isn't in his own handiwork, it's in what surrounds it: the car parked under a freshly painted window frame, the ladder sliding out from under the protective sheeting, the shop window that pays for one wrong move during a façade job. The claims pattern in contracting trades is “damage caused to the surroundings” – and that's what the cover needs to be tuned to.
Painter-tiler claims form in three layers. The first is inside the work area: parquet flooring ruined by inadequate dust-sheeting, a sanitary fitting damaged while cutting tiles, a light fitting torn loose. The second is at the edge of the work area: plaster or paint falling from a façade onto the pavement, cars, or a shop window – here the injured parties are already outsiders, not the client. The third is personal injury: a passer-by walking under the scaffolding, a resident slipping in the stairwell. Work at height deserves special attention: policies typically treat scaffolding- and ladder-based work under separate terms.
Here too, the backbone is public liability – with the limit sized not to the price of the paint but to the value of the surroundings: a row of cars parked under a city-centre façade, or the shop windows along a row of stores, can add up to a serious chain of damage (limit sizing). The cover extension for the surface being worked on is a cornerstone of trade policies. Anyone working as a subcontractor on a larger project lives daily with chain rules (main contractor–subcontractor) and their own certificate-readiness (article); anyone who brings in subcontractors of their own faces the question of standing behind that work (chain checklist). On construction-project-scale jobs, the world of project insurance also opens up – that's the related area covered in the construction project article.
Fecó's experience: main contractors and more demanding clients now routinely ask for proof of liability cover as a contract condition, sometimes with a required limit and content tailored to the job. This isn't distrust, it's risk management – and whoever can produce the certificate on the first ask has a competitive edge (client requirements).
Good dust-sheeting is cheaper than good insurance – but the two together are what let you sleep at night. Fecó photographs before starting and at handover, keeps a work log (loss prevention), and knows that if a claim comes in, he doesn't argue on site – he documents it and reports it via the insurer's claims line (first steps). And his cover is sized to what surrounds the job, not to what he's actually painting. If you'd like to set yours up the same way: free consultation here.
Fecó's best story isn't a claim – it's a near miss. During a façade job, a paint bucket tipped over on the lower level of the scaffolding, slid down the edge of the sheeting, and stopped ten centimetres from the shop window. That evening Fecó did two things: he worked through what would have happened if the bucket had slid ten centimetres further (glass, the shopfront, the stock on display, the shop's lost trading days) – and he called to review his limit. A “near-miss claim” is the best adviser there is: it shows you, for free, what you actually need to size for. The lesson goes wider than painting: in any trade, it's worth thinking through the situations you got away with – it's exactly what one of the questions in our self-check quiz is built on.
A question tailored to your own trade? Book a free 20-minute consultation →
Free of charge, no obligation – at the end, you'll see exactly your options and the next step.
