Protecting computer equipment in a remote working world

Authored by NMU

Many businesses have very quickly had to adapt to new working environments during the last 12 months and in some cases, this has led to employees needing to take computer equipment away from business premises or indeed using their own personal devices for business purposes, as they work remotely.

Insurance protection for office equipment is traditionally placed under a commercial combined policy, but wouldn’t ordinarily cover such equipment whilst at the home of an employee or indeed any other third-party location.

Our new Computer Insurance product, which launched in December 2020, was developed to not only consider the working environments we now find ourselves in but also with the potential future of work and advances in the scope of office equipment, firmly in mind.

Where NMU can help

Development Underwriter, Matt Shaw talks us through a recent example of where he assisted a broker partner in placing their clients’ computer exposures, in the current normal.

The client is an online retailer and had recently expanded to ship goods across the world. They were seeking a flexible approach for protecting both static & portable equipment globally, and in particular employees own devices used for the purposes of the business under a ‘Bring Your Own Device’ initiative (BYOD).

Cover was previously placed under a commercial combined policy but elements of the cover were restrictive, such as forcible and violent entry restrictions in the event of theft at the insured premises. The policy also didn’t cater for the flexibility the client required for employees working from home using their own or corporate devices to support flexible and remote working.

As standard our new Computer Insurance product provides additional cover for employees’ own equipment and even goes one step further by providing theft cover in outbuildings to further protect insured equipment when used in a converted office space, an outbuilding in the garden for example.

Alleviating the concerns of standalone computer policies

A typical concern around placing computer in isolation away from a commercial combined policy is the potential for the client having to pay a deductible or excess on both policies, in the event of damage to both the insured premises and computer equipment.

We have alleviated this concern by including a deductible waiver, where the insured benefits from paying just one deductible or excess for the incident. For example, thieves break into an insureds premises and steal computer equipment – In doing so, damage is sustained to shutters resulting in a claim being pursued against the property insurance.
In this scenario we will waive our rights to a deductible or excess on the computer policy as a deductible or excess has been applied under another insurance arrangement which is providing cover for the damage incurred to the shutters.

Multi-risk discount

In addition to providing a flexible solution on their computer hardware exposures, we identified that the client required protection against the ever increasing risk of Cyber related incidents.

Being in the online retail sector, the client held customer information including payment details and were concerned about data breaches and the damage a Cyber event could mean to their business and reputation. As such, we were able to provide protection with our standalone CyberSafe solution.

As with all customers who place both Computer Insurance and CyberSafe Insurance policies at the same time with NMU throughout 2021, we provided a multi-risk discount of 50% on their computer policy. This multi-risk discount is available up to a maximum of GBP500.

As a retailer responsible for the movement of goods, a cargo solution was also taken up to protect their exposure of manufactured products through the supply chain including during import, storage and subsequent worldwide distribution, by way of a stock throughput policy.

Building insurance solutions based upon a real understanding of the risks faced by policyholders

We made the difference by taking the time to understand the client’s business, developing a solution that protects the individual needs of modern and agile businesses and adding value by being able to complement Computer Insurance with standalone CyberSafe Insurance, and in this example, Cargo Insurance too.

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