Employers liability insurance to cover company secretary?

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

Up until recently, being the sole director of my company I've never bothered with employers liability insurance as it wasn't a legal requirement and had never needed it for any of my contracts. I've always made do with PI and more recently, PL insurance.

My partner is now company secretary and will also be taking over some admin duties and receives a small salary so my understanding is that I'm now legally obliged to get employers liability insurance (we aren't yet married so I don't think the family exemption applies).

I already have PL insurance with QDOS for £45 or so a year so thought it would be simple enough to just add EL on for another £45 but they are insisting I need it to cover two people and want double the premium. I don't need the PL cover to extend to my partner, I just need the minimum necessary EL insurance to meet my legal obligations.

Assuming I am correct about needing EL now (please correct me if I'm wrong), can anybody recommend a cheap place to get just EL insurance?

Also, as we are getting married in April next year, I assume I won't need to bother renewing this in a years time?

[northernladuk]

QDOS do PI/PL for about £240 including 3 free contract checks. Bit of a no brainer really.

You say company secretary from a job title point of view or a registered secretary of the company? You don't need the latter any more.

Secretaries

It appears that you do indeed need EL to cover your legal responsibilities...

http://www.qdosconsulting.com/freela...lity-insurance

Employers Liability Insurance is legally required in some potentially unexpected circumstances – for example, where a Limited Company contractor employs their partner/spouse to carry out clerical work or bookkeeping for the business.

It's peanuts. Buy it, forget it.

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

QDOS do PI/PL for about £240 including 3 free contract checks. Bit of a no brainer really.

You say company secretary from a job title point of view or a registered secretary of the company? You don't need the latter any more.

Secretaries

Registered secretary. I'm aware I don't *need* one though. Having her as an officer of the company has the benefit of making her eligible for ER on any capital proceeds from her shares though so was worth doing and accountant agreed (something worth bearing in mind for anyone else here whose spouse/partner has company shares - I think I've seen a few of the regular accountants on here mention it too).

I already have PI and PL with QDOS totally just over £200, however the total quote for PL and EL to cover both of us is £160, on top of my £150 PI.

A quick search online for quotes reveals I'm not likely to get much cheaper than £100 for the EL insurance so I guess I'll just have to bite the bullet. I'm pretty sure I won't need it after we're married anyway so it's only for a year I guess.

EDIT: in response to that quote from the QDOS website, I read that too. I think they're wrong to include spouse in that statement though as the act does specifically exclude family members including spouses. Won't apply to me until after next April though unfortunately.

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

Bit the bullet, rang back QDOS and had them cancel my existing PL policy (they can't add to it for some reason). New PL/EL policy for 2 people came to £155 for the year. Will revert back to a sole PL policy for one person in a year. A small price to pay for the overall benefits I suppose, I'm just being tight.

EDIT: turns out I misread the exemption for family employees - it doesn't apply if you're a Ltd company so needed even if married. Seems utterly pointless to me, but there you go.

[Sausage Surprise]

Up until recently, being the sole director of my company I've never bothered with employers liability insurance as it wasn't a legal requirement and had never needed it for any of my contracts. I've always made do with PI and more recently, PL insurance.

My partner is now company secretary and will also be taking over some admin duties and receives a small salary so my understanding is that I'm now legally obliged to get employers liability insurance (we aren't yet married so I don't think the family exemption applies).

I already have PL insurance with QDOS for £45 or so a year so thought it would be simple enough to just add EL on for another £45 but they are insisting I need it to cover two people and want double the premium. I don't need the PL cover to extend to my partner, I just need the minimum necessary EL insurance to meet my legal obligations.

Assuming I am correct about needing EL now (please correct me if I'm wrong), can anybody recommend a cheap place to get just EL insurance?

Also, as we are getting married in April next year, I assume I won't need to bother renewing this in a years time?

Why bother making her a salaried secretary in the first place and pretend she is doing work? Just make a her a joint shareholder.

[DirtyDog]

Why bother making her a salaried secretary in the first place and pretend she is doing work? Just make a her a joint shareholder.

And then deal with S660?

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

Why bother making her a salaried secretary in the first place and pretend she is doing work? Just make a her a joint shareholder.

She is a 25% shareholder. Nobody is pretending anything, she is doing work. She only receives a small salary. As mentioned above, being a company officer means she will get ER on any capital gains if/when the company is closed down. Additionally, it extends the amount of weekly childcare we can put through the company for our daughter.

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

And then deal with S660?

Very unlikely to be an issue these days unless you're doing something very obviously dodgy (e.g. giving shares to children or other connected people other than your spouse, using waivers etc.). Don't want to start another settlements legislation discussion as it's been done to death on here. I'm satisfied with our legal position, my accountant is happy and so is the tax specialist he engaged to do the company valuation and CGT calculation for the share transfer.

[DirtyDog]

Very unlikely to be an issue these days unless you're doing something very obviously dodgy (e.g. giving shares to children or other connected people other than your spouse, using waivers etc.). Don't want to start another settlements legislation discussion as it's been done to death on here. I'm satisfied with our legal position, my accountant is happy and so is the tax specialist he engaged to do the company valuation and CGT calculation for the share transfer.

I made the assumption that the throwaway line "just make her a joint shareholder", implied giving shares to a connected person who isn't your spouse, rather than actually having a valuation for a share transfer.

[TheCyclingProgrammer]

I made the assumption that the throwaway line "just make her a joint shareholder", implied giving shares to a connected person who isn't your spouse, rather than actually having a valuation for a share transfer.

Sure, but an unmarried partner is not a connected person as far as the settlements legislation is concerned anyway. In fact, I'm pretty sure that besides a spouse/civil partner, the only other specific connected person mentioned in the legislation are children.