Wages are going out of the ledger, so at least one person is employed. A ledger cannot show how many, so the headcount still needs confirming. The Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969 makes cover a duty from the first employee and sets the floor at £5,000,000. Most policies are written at £10,000,000.
What the books say this business needs, against what it is on record as holding. Only the lines marked required by law are a legal duty. The rest set out an exposure for the customer to decide about. This is the statement of demands and needs, and every line opens to say what put it there.
| Cover | Position | Held now | Indicated | Indicative, monthly |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Employers' Liability
required by law
WhyThis line rests on something the engine worked out, not on something the customer has confirmed. Wages are going out of the ledger, so at least one person is employed. A ledger cannot show how many, so the headcount still needs confirming. The Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969 makes cover a duty from the first employee and sets the floor at £5,000,000. Most policies are written at £10,000,000. fired by people.employees |
not held | nothing | £10,000,000 | £9.75 to £15.25 |
|
Hired in Plant
contractual
WhyThis line rests on something the engine worked out, not on something the customer has confirmed. Covers hired plant and machinery if it is stolen or damaged. The hire agreement normally makes whoever hired it responsible while it is on site, and hired items never appear in the business's own asset register, so nothing else on this page would catch them. fired by assets.items |
not held | nothing | – | £6.24 to £9.76 |
|
Public Liability
exposure
WhyThis line rests on something the engine worked out, not on something the customer has confirmed. Covers the cost when the work injures somebody else or damages their property. Set at £5,000,000 because working at height means more that can fall on somebody; hot work can start a fire. A liability limit pays in full up to the limit and nothing above it, so this is not a proportional shortfall like an under-set sum insured. It is the point at which a large claim stops being covered, and the limit was last set in May 2019. Last set on 1 May 2019. fired by trade.primary, operations.heightWork, operations.hotWork |
below indicated | £2,000,000 | £5,000,000 | £49.24 to £77.02 |
|
Tools & Materials
exposure
WhyCovers replacing tools that are lost, stolen or damaged. The sum insured comes from 6 registered items at today's replacement cost, which is what they would cost to buy again rather than the depreciated book value sitting in the accounts. That is a shortfall of £4,500, about 60%, and the sum insured was last set in May 2019. Where a policy carries an average clause, a shortfall of this size can reduce every settlement by the same proportion, including partial losses well below the sum insured. Last set on 1 May 2019. fired by assets.items, assets.toolsTotal |
£4,500 short | £3,000 | £7,500 | £36.56 to £57.19 |
|
Contract Works
exposure
WhyCovers redoing work that is damaged on site before it is handed over. Sized at about a quarter of annual turnover, which is a working estimate of the biggest job likely to be open at any one time. fired by trade.primary, operations.workType, financials.turnoverBand |
not held | nothing | £95,000 | £49.40 to £77.27 |
|
Legal Expenses
recommended
WhyThis line rests on something the engine worked out, not on something the customer has confirmed. Covers the legal bill when there is a dispute. Once there are staff there can be an employment tribunal, which is the most common legal expenses claim at this size of business. fired by people.employees |
not held | nothing | – | £4.29 to £6.71 |
These are the things the engine worked out rather than was told, and each one changes an answer further up. Answering one turns it from something read off a ledger into something the customer has said, which is what stops cover being sold against a wrong guess. Every card says what it changes.
Nobody typed any of this in. Every number above came out of one of these reads, and every fact carries where it came from and how sure the engine is about it.
Also reads as: Builder
£1,866 to £2,918 a year across 6 products. A band, not a quote.
Anchored on Admiral Business's published Public Liability rate of £6.07 a month (single carpenter, £1,000,000 cover, as at 22 April 2026). Employers' Liability: 1 employee at £5 for the first and £3.5 thereafter, × 2.50 trade risk. Hired in Plant: flat £8 while items are on hire. Public Liability: £6.07 anchor × 2.5 trade risk × 1.6 cover level × 2.6 turnover. Tools & Materials: 7.5% a year on a £7,500 sum insured. Contract Works: 0.8% a year on a £95,000 sum insured. Legal Expenses: flat £5.5. Band is ±22%.
Valued at what it would cost to buy again today, not at what the accounts say it is worth after depreciation. This is the list a claim gets paid against.
| Item | Category | Replacement |
|---|---|---|
| Power tools from Screwfix Direct Cardiff | Power tools | £1,272 |
| Makita 18v LXT 6-piece kit | Power tools | £925 |
| Power tools from Toolstation | Power tools | £434 |
| Power tools from Dewalt Cordless KIT | Power tools | £1,280 |
| Power tools from Screwfix Direct | Power tools | £2,669 |
| Plant hire from HSS Hire (recurring, 12 months) | Other | needs a valuation |
| Plant hire from Scaffold Hire South Wales | Other | needs a valuation |
| Sievert hot air felt welding kit | Power tools | £720 |
A CSV exported from a bank or an accounts package. It is read in the request that carried it and thrown away when that request ends, and the file itself is never written down. The engine says what it made of the columns before it uses any of it, and anything the file cannot settle for itself is asked rather than assumed.
Choose the second option for an expenses sheet, where every amount is positive and nothing in the file says which way the money went. No export to hand? Take a sample, which is a fictional trade's year.
Illustrative only. This is a statement of demands and needs based on public records and information you confirm, not a personal recommendation or a quote. Prices are banded estimates derived from published rates and are not an offer of cover.