Office Insurance Cardiff

Most Cardiff office businesses are tenants, and almost everything that matters about their insurance follows from that. You occupy part of a building somebody else owns, insured under somebody else’s policy, sharing a lobby, lifts, risers and a fire strategy with businesses you have no control over. What you are actually insuring is your contents, the fit-out you paid for, your people, your data and your ability to keep trading — not the structure.

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FCA directly authorised, FRN 724952
17 years in business
a named broker reads every submission.

The city gives you that arrangement in two flavours. There are the modern floors in and around the centre and the Bay, purpose-built, multi-tenanted and managed, where the building insurance is comprehensive but the service charge and the lease decide who is responsible for the fit-out. And there is the older stock: Victorian and Edwardian townhouses and converted buildings in the streets around the centre, used as offices by professional firms, agencies and small practices, where the fabric is period, the services are retro-fitted and the fire and access arrangements were designed for a house.

The exposures that actually bite an office business are therefore unglamorous. Denial of access because something happened elsewhere in your building. A fit-out you paid for and never insured. A cyber incident that stops the business without damaging a single physical thing. And an employment dispute. Apex is a Bristol-based commercial broker and arranges office cover around those, through a named broker rather than a portal.

The cover an office business in Cardiff usually needs

Office contents and equipment — furniture, computers, screens, servers and everything else you brought in. Sums insured should be on a reinstatement basis and reviewed after any growth or fit-out, because this is one of the most commonly underinsured items on a commercial policy.
Tenants’ improvements — the partitions, kitchens, cabling, flooring and fit-out you paid for. The landlord’s building policy generally does not cover them and the lease usually makes them yours to reinstate. Firms discover this after a fire, not before.
Business interruption — the cover that decides whether you survive an incident. It should include denial of access, so that an event elsewhere in a shared building — or in the street outside — is covered, and the indemnity period should reflect how long it would really take to find space, refit and get back to normal trading.
Public liability — injury to visitors and members of the public, and damage you cause to the landlord’s building or to a neighbouring occupier.
Employers’ liability — compulsory once you have staff, and it applies to hybrid and homeworking employees as well as to the ones at a desk in the office.
Cyber — the exposure most likely to stop an office business, and the one least likely to be adequately covered by a basic package extension. Incident response, data breach handling, business interruption and funds-transfer fraud are the elements worth looking at properly.
Management liability — directors’ and officers’ cover, employment practices liability and corporate legal liability. Employment disputes are the most common trigger in businesses of this size.
Professional indemnity — a separate and necessary cover for any firm giving advice — legal, financial, accountancy, consultancy, surveying, marketing, technology. An office package will not answer an advice claim.

Cardiff premises and the risks that come with them

Where your office is, and what kind of building it occupies, drives most of the difference between one office policy and another.

Modern multi-tenant floors — purpose-built office buildings in and around the centre and the Bay are managed, shared and busy. Your business interruption exposure includes anything that closes the building — a fire on another floor, a services failure, an incident that puts a cordon across the entrance.
Period townhouses in office use — a great deal of professional and creative office space in the streets around the centre is converted period housing. Older fabric, retro-fitted services, domestic stairs and limited accessibility bring their own liability and property considerations, and escape of water in an old building damages several floors at once.
Serviced and co-working space — flexible space is common in the city, and the licence you sign is not a lease. What the operator insures, what you insure and what happens if the operator’s building becomes unusable are all worth reading before you assume you are covered.
Public-sector and regulated clients — a city with a large public-sector, media and financial-services presence means many local firms hold contracts with public bodies or regulated organisations. Those contracts routinely specify minimum insurance limits, data-protection terms and cyber requirements.

The four things office businesses get wrong

Underinsuring contents and fit-out. sums insured are set when a business moves in and then left alone for years while headcount, equipment and the fit-out all grow. Average and underinsurance clauses then reduce the payment on every claim, not only on a total loss. A review at each renewal is the cheapest protection there is.

Assuming the landlord covers everything. the building policy covers the building. It does not ordinarily cover your partitions, your kitchen, your cabling or your furniture, and the lease will usually make reinstating them your obligation. Read the repairing and insuring clauses, then insure the difference.

Treating cyber as an add-on. for an office business, the incident most likely to stop trading is digital, not physical. A basic cyber extension inside a package policy is usually thin on incident response and business interruption, which are the two parts that actually matter when it happens.

Compliance and contract considerations

Employers’ liability is compulsory once you employ anyone, and the certificate must be available to employees; the duty extends to hybrid and homeworking staff.

UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act govern client and employee data, with breach notification duties on short timescales.

Lease terms determine who insures the structure, who insures the fit-out and who reinstates what; the insurance should be arranged to match the lease rather than the assumption.

Client and public-sector contracts commonly specify minimum liability and professional indemnity limits, cyber requirements and data-processing terms. Check that what you signed matches what you hold.

What can go wrong

A fire on another floor closes the whole building for weeks and you cannot get to your desks — denial of access under business interruption, if the policy includes it.

A pipe fails in a converted period building and water damages equipment, records and the fit-out on the floors below — property damage plus liability to the other occupiers.

A ransomware incident encrypts systems and stops the business trading for a fortnight without any physical damage at all — cyber cover, and the response element matters as much as the indemnity.

An employee brings a tribunal claim — employment practices liability under a management liability policy, where the defence cost is usually the larger number.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need insurance if my landlord already insures the building?

Yes, and for different things. The landlord insures the structure and usually recharges the premium through the service charge. That policy will not cover your contents, your equipment, the fit-out you paid for, your liability to staff and visitors, or your income if you cannot trade. Those are the parts the lease leaves with you.

What are tenants’ improvements and why do they matter here?

They are the partitions, kitchens, flooring, cabling and finishes you installed. They usually belong legally to the building but are yours to reinstate under the lease, and they are frequently uninsured by anybody. In converted period townhouses in particular, a good fit-out can be a substantial figure that appears nowhere on the policy schedule.

How long should my business interruption indemnity period be?

Long enough to find space, fit it out, move and recover the trading you lost. For most office businesses that is longer than the twelve months so often selected by default, and the wording should include denial of access so that an event elsewhere in a shared building is covered.

Is the cyber cover in my package policy enough?

Usually not. Basic extensions tend to be limited on the two things that decide the outcome: immediate incident response, and business interruption while systems are unavailable. If you hold client data, take payments or would be unable to work without your systems for a week, standalone cyber cover is worth pricing properly.

We are in serviced or co-working space. What do we still need?

More than people assume. A licence to occupy is not a lease, and the operator’s insurance covers the operator. You still need your own contents and equipment cover, public and employers’ liability, cyber, and business interruption — including what happens if the operator’s building becomes unusable and you have to move at short notice.

Our clients include public bodies in Wales. Does that affect our insurance?

It usually affects the limits and the terms rather than the covers. Public-sector and regulated-client contracts commonly specify minimum public liability, employers’ liability and professional indemnity limits, along with data-protection and cyber requirements, and increasingly Welsh-language obligations in how services are delivered. We check the contracts against the policies so you are not signing up to something you do not hold.

Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Firm reference number 724952. Registered in England and Wales, company number 07014570. Trading address: QCS, 53 Queen Charlotte Street, Bristol BS1 4HQ. This page is general information about commercial insurance and is not advice tailored to any individual business. Cover and terms are subject to underwriter assessment and the policy wording.

Speak to a named commercial broker

Tell us about the business and we’ll place it on the specialist market, or leave your number and a named broker calls you back — usually the same working day. Call 0117 325 0027 or email info@apexinsurancebrokers.co.uk.

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