Business insurance for PR and communications consultants

Your work as a public relations (PR) and communications consultant is all about promoting brands and shielding them from reputational harm. Insurance can help to protect your business in turn.

If you’re organising media events, public liability insurance could help you to manage risks to people and property. For example, if a banner pole injures a guest speaker.

Explore tailored insurance for PR consultants with Hiscox.

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Why choose Hiscox for PR and communications consultant insurance?

Monthly cover from £8.40*It's easy to tailor our insurance for a public relations consultant to the size and needs of your firm.

*Figures based on an average of all business insurance policies sold to at least 10% of our customer base between April 2023 and April 2024

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Our customer-first approach has won us the Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award over consecutive years.

Get PI cover of up to £10 million

Our professional indemnity insurance could handle legal expenses running into the millions.

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Why do PR and communications consultants need insurance?

Defamation lawsuit

You’ve worked with a health food brand for many years and enjoyed great success promoting its products. But the client has endured a tough few months. Customers have criticised recipe changes and questioned their health benefits. To get the brand back on track, you write a press release, highlighting the edge it has over rivals. It receives a positive response – until a competitor alleges you’ve made false claims. It launches defamation proceedings.

Professional indemnity insurance could shield PR consultants from the costs of defamation claims. These could relate to libel, slander or product disparagement, for example.

Accident at an event

To promote yourself as a PR thought leader, you schedule a speech at a business conference. The set-up is busy: you arrange marketing flags while your client runs through the agenda. Amid the turmoil, a guest speaker enters and is injured by a banner pole you hadn’t yet secured.

In this scenario, a PR consultant could benefit from public liability insurance. This specialist cover can help to cover compensation costs and legal expenses.

Sensitive data breach

Your client asks you to put together a new campaign, targeting younger customers. They hand you a spreadsheet of sensitive data, covering recent buying trends. After crunching the numbers, you’re ready to get things moving. The trouble comes when you accidentally send a copy to a different client. The original client finds out and threatens to sue you for a privacy breach.

Cyber and data insurance could help a public relations consultant to deal with similar breaches.

What insurance is available for PR and communications consultants?

Professional indemnity insurance

Professional indemnity insurance can help to financially protect communications specialists from claims by dissatisfied clients. You might face claims of inadequate advice or a contract breach, for example. Or a failure to meet comparative advertising standards. Alternatively, you may stand accused of an intellectual property infringement. This could relate to characters or trademarks.

PI cover may also support you with rectification costs. This means you could put a mistake right before your client even notices, helping to protect your reputation as well as theirs.

Learn more about professional indemnity insurance

Public liability insurance

Public liability insurance could protect you from the financial consequences of injuries or property damage caused by your work. The cover can step in to meet compensation demands, pay legal fees and can even compensate you for court attendance.

PR is a public-facing career by nature. There are many places you could encounter clients and members of the public, from press conferences and trade shows to award ceremonies and photoshoots. With public liability cover in place, you can work with confidence.

Learn more about public liability insurance

Employers’ liability insurance

Employers’ liability insurance is usually mandatory for any PR consultant with staff members. This cover can help to deal with compensation costs that arise from work-related illnesses or injuries sustained by your team. It can help to compensate current or former employees, and to pay your legal fees.

Many PR and communications consultants work alone. But EL cover could become a legal requirement (external link) if you take on extra help during busier months.

Learn more about employers’ liability insurance

At Hiscox, insurance for a public relations consultant doesn’t end there. You could also build portable equipment, office, cyber, legal protection, and directors’ and officers’ insurance into a tailored policy.

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Insurance for PR and communications consultants: FAQs

How long do I need PI insurance for?

Professional indemnity insurance could come in handy from the moment you go into business. You’ll be covered until the day you wind things down and beyond as we also offer run off cover for professional indemnity insurance. Assuming there are no policy interruptions, it’ll be valid from the retroactive date. This is the date when you originally took out the uninterrupted cover. Contact us for more information regarding our PI run off cover.

How much professional indemnity insurance do I need?

For a PR consultancy, the optimum level of professional indemnity insurance will depend on the size and nature of your business. For example, you could face greater risks if you specialise in crisis management and repairing reputations. In contrast, internal tasks may pose fewer threats.

Geography might also prove important. A PR consultancy working with major brands in the US and other territories could face a wider variety of risks. Those working with smaller UK clients may have more localised concerns.

Learn more about PI requirements

Can business insurance cover my equipment while I travel?

Yes, insurance for communications and PR consultants could cover your equipment on the move within the UK. To access this benefit, you’ll need to build portable equipment insurance into your policy. This type of cover may protect gadgets like laptops, cameras and phones from theft, loss or damage within the geographical limits of the policy. Generally, this means within the UK, but you can tailor your policy to cover Europe and worldwide.

Can I work without public liability insurance?

Yes, it’s possible for a PR or communications consultant to work without public liability insurance in the UK. That’s because it is not a legal requirement. However, you wouldn’t have a safety net if an injury or property damage resulted from your work. Instead, you’d have to face compensation expenses and court fees alone.

What insurance do I need to work in the PR industry?

The insurance you’ll need in the PR sector depends on your business circumstances. For example, enhancing or repairing client reputations may prove delicate. So, professional indemnity cover could provide support if a campaign goes awry, or you fall short of comparative advertising standards.

Meanwhile, public liability insurance might handle injury claims stemming from media events or photoshoots. And employers’ liability insurance is usually a legal requirement once you take on staff.