About Public and Products Liability Insurance
If an accident or unforeseeable incident causes damage or injury to someone (other than your employees), you may be found legally liable to cover the costs. Public liability insurance can help to protect your business from the financial risk of liability claims – giving you the certainty you need to trade with confidence.
Make a claim▸
What is product liability insurance?
No matter how stringent your company is, mistakes can happen. For example, you may design or sell a product that causes a customer harm. Even if you’re not at fault, you could risk serious financial damage through legal and court costs if a customer decides to sue you.
Product liability insurance is designed to help protect your business if you’re sued because a product you sell, assemble or supply has caused harm to a person or property.
Who should consider it?
While public and product liability insurance isn’t mandatory for most businesses, it is recommended for all companies. That’s because the unpredictable nature of accidents makes them hard to prevent – and the costs of being sued can be extraordinarily high.
get a quote ▸
➤ in fact
"Public liability insurance helps protect you and your business against the financial risk of being liable for negligence.”
Australian Government, Business.gov.au
Case Study
The offshore manufacturer of George’s sunscreen accidentally contaminates the product with chemicals that cause customers to break out in a painful rash.
They file a class suit against George to compensate them for the injury. Luckily, George’s policy covers him for the costs of going to court and the damages awarded to the customers.
Did you know?
9,000
429
Property and Business
In 2013, there were close to 32,000 public liability claims made. Of these claims, just over 9,000 were claims for bodily injury.
(APRA, Review of Claims Trends for Liability Insurance in Australia, 2014)
In 2014, property and business services was the sector with the highest exposure to public liability risk. It was followed by construction; retail; agriculture, forestry & fishing; personal services; and health and community services.
(APRA, Review of Claims Trends for Liability Insurance in Australia, 2014)
Since 2012, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has recalled an average of 429 products each year.
(Shine Lawyers, ‘China-Australia Free Trade Agreement: potential commercial implications’, 2017)
What can it cover?
Public and products liability insurance helps protect your legal liability to third parties, including clients, customers and the public for injury or damage to their property, caused by your business. It can even cover emotional distress or shock that your business causes another person.
It will generally pay your costs of investigating, defending and settling claims, as well as any compensation payment you are found legally liable to pay.
Download the latest brochure ▸
Important note
This information is provided to assist you in understanding some of the terms, implications and commons considerations of Public and products liability insurance, it is not complete, so please request full details from your Steadfast insurance broker. You should consider the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS) in deciding whether to buy (or continue to hold) this insurance and also whether this insurance is appropriate for you. The PDS can be obtained from Sky Financial Group. Deductibles, exclusions and limits apply. Public and products liability insurance is issued by various insurers.
Sky Financial Group is an Authorised Representative of Fay Baker 79619240801 - 336757