FCA authorised · FRN 724952 0117 325 0027Quote & buy →
The default answer for most groups is a composite programme: one set of policies naming the parent and its subsidiaries as insureds. It buys better — the group’s whole premium spend is presented to insurers as one risk — and it manages better, with one renewal, one claims protocol and no gaps where a subsidiary’s cover silently lapsed. Separate policies still earn their place in specific cases: a regulated subsidiary with its own compliance requirements, an entity being groomed for sale, or a business whose risk profile would poison terms for the rest of the group. The point is to choose, entity by entity, rather than let history decide.
Whichever route you take, the schedule of insured entities is the group programme’s equivalent of the multi-site schedule of locations: it must name every company that needs cover, and it must be maintained as the group changes. “Subsidiaries as now or hereafter constituted” wordings help, but they have edges — acquisitions above a size threshold or outside the group’s trade often need notifying.
Insurance due diligence is cheap compared with what it finds: underinsured property, expired covers, a claims history the seller did not volunteer, liabilities — product, environmental, employment — that will arrive with the shares. What you learn shapes the price and the warranties, and it tells you what the group programme must absorb on day one.
The acquired company either joins the group programme immediately or runs its existing policies to expiry. Joining at once is cleaner but needs arranging in advance; running to expiry means the group carries two sets of terms for a while and the renewal dates drift apart. Most groups converge on a single common renewal date at the first opportunity, occasionally using a short-period policy to bridge the gap.
The acquired company’s old liabilities do not vanish at completion. Claims-made covers — directors’ and officers’, professional indemnity — stop responding to past acts once the old policies lapse, so run-off cover for the acquired entity’s previous management and advice is usually essential. Your own policies cover the future; the past needs its own arrangement.
Naming several group companies on one policy has a side effect: joint insureds generally cannot claim against one another under it. Usually that is harmless. But where real liabilities run between group companies — a property company letting premises to the trading company, one entity supplying another, staff employed by a service company and seconded across the group — the programme has to be structured so those exposures land somewhere that responds. This is exactly the kind of detail that never surfaces in a form-driven placement and routinely surfaces when a broker sits down with the org chart.
Directors’ and officers’ cover should follow the org chart, and often does not. A group policy typically protects directors of the parent and its scheduled subsidiaries — but check how it treats new acquisitions, joint ventures, dormant companies and directors sitting on outside boards at the group’s request. Limits deserve group-level thinking too: one shared limit across every director of every entity can be thinner than it looks. Our D&O guide covers the cover itself, and management liability the wider package for boards.
We run this as a programme, not a stack of policies: one risk presentation for the whole group, one renewal, entity schedule reconciled against Companies House, and a standing brief to call us before — not after — the next acquisition completes. We arrange programmes like this as a group ourselves — Solar Protect is part of our own group — so the mechanics are ones we live with, not just advise on. And as with every larger risk: send the renewal pack and we will come to you, walk the sites that matter and meet the people who run them.
Usually, yes. A composite programme names the parent and its subsidiaries as insureds under one set of policies. It is generally cheaper and far easier to manage than separate policies per company — but the schedule of insured entities must be kept current, and the limits must be sized for the group’s aggregate exposure, not one company’s.
Treat insurance as part of due diligence: review the target’s policies, claims history and any gaps before completion. On completion, decide whether it joins the group programme immediately or runs its own policies to their expiry, and arrange run-off cover for liabilities arising from what it did before you owned it — particularly for directors’ and officers’ and professional liabilities.
They do not need to, but programmes work better when they do. A common renewal date lets the whole group be presented and marketed as one risk, avoids a rolling year of renewals, and stops covers drifting apart. Acquired companies are usually aligned at the first sensible opportunity, sometimes with a short-period policy to bridge.
Only if the policy is written that way. Group D&O policies typically cover directors of the parent and scheduled subsidiaries, but newly acquired entities, joint ventures and outside directorships may need to be added or separately addressed — and past acts of an acquired company’s directors usually need run-off under the old policy rather than cover under yours.
Intra-group claims are a known blind spot. Liability policies are built around claims from third parties, and joint-names insureds generally cannot claim against each other under the same policy. Where one group company could genuinely be liable to another — landlord and tenant, supplier and customer — the programme needs to be structured with that in mind rather than assumed to respond.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN 724952). This page is general information, not advice on a specific policy.
