Most businesses have liability insurance – but few know exactly what it covers. The contract was signed years ago, the business has grown since, the profile has widened, and the paperwork has stayed in the drawer. A policy review is built for exactly this situation: a structured walk-through that ends in one of two sentences – “this is fine” or “here and here, it needs adjusting.” This article shows how it works.
- A policy review isn't switching-in-disguise: its most common outcome is reassurance, or a handful of targeted adjustments.
- The six checkpoints: list of insured activities, limits, deductible, temporal scope, exclusions, external requirements.
- What you need: the policy, the terms, and a little time – or a free consultation, where you can ask questions.
The six checkpoints
1. List of insured activities: does what's recorded in the policy match today's reality, including new services and shifts in your mix (the change-reporting article)? This is the first checkpoint, because it's where gaps are most common, and most dangerous. 2. Limits: is the per-event and annual limit, and the inner limits, sized to your current book of contracts and project sizes (the limit article)? 3. Deductible: is the amount and form still comfortable to carry today (the deductible article)? 4. Temporal scope: what logic does the cover run on, what's the retroactive date, what would happen at a switch or a close-down (the key article, the temporal-scope article)? 5. Exclusions and extensions: which exclusions touching your own risks can be lifted, and is your set of extensions complete (the exclusions map, modules)? 6. External requirements: does the contract meet chamber, client and tender requirements (the minimum-limit article)?
What typically comes to light?
Experience shows three outcomes. In some cases, everything checks out – the value of the review here is certainty: you know what to expect. It's common to find a handful of targeted adjustments: an activity to report, a limit to raise, a missing extension – small admin, a big difference at claim time. And sometimes there's structural drift: the business has outgrown the contract, and a redesign is worth it – which is where the path to a competitive process opens up (the comparison table article), following the rules of continuity (switching).
Do it yourself – or together
For a self-review, the policy-check checklist walks you through it point by point. A joint review is faster and goes deeper: bring (or send ahead) your policy and terms to a free consultation – at the end, you'll get it in writing what's fine and what needs adjusting. There's no obligation: a review is worth having even if nothing changes – because then, at least, you know that for certain.
Example: the record of a review
A review of a six-year-old policy turned up this, in half an hour: the list of insured activities was two items short of reality (services launched in the meantime); the limit was sized to revenue from six years ago – the business has since roughly doubled; the tenant extension was missing, even though the business has operated out of a rented hall for two years; the retroactive date, on the other hand, was fine, and so was the exclusions list. The result list, then: two things to report, one limit increase, one module – and a reassuring foundation to build all of it on, without switching. This is the typical outcome: not a disaster, just drift – the policy was fine, the business just quietly outgrew it. The half hour is what caught that quiet drift, in time.
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