For those who don’t take global warming seriously by now, you might be surprised at the predictions that have been made by the Environment Agency (EA) regarding UK flood defence.

Reaching unprecedented levels

Climate change has already had a major impact on British coastlines, moorlands, farms, towns and cities, not to mention the effect it’s had on vast numbers of seabirds in the North Sea and North Atlantic who are struggling to find food due to dwindling prey. While flooding has always been an issue for certain areas in the UK, recent years have seen waters rise to unprecedented levels. This has left many businesses and homeowners stranded in the meantime.Following major flooding in areas including York and Greater Manchester in 2015, councils have started to invest more in flood defence to reduce the devastation and downtime the floods caused. Yet despite an increase of flood defences in place, EA chairwoman, Emma Howard Boyd, believes that this will not be enough, warning that “we cannot win a war against water”.

Improved defences

While we cannot prevent flooding, we can implement improved measures to better manage flooding and protect both residents and businesses. In a bid to combat climate change, the EA believes that the UK will need to invest at least £1 billion per year into traditional flood and coastal defences to make communities more resilient against flooding.The type of defence required goes beyond building bigger barriers, which has been realised in the York Flood Alleviation Scheme. Instead of focusing on constructing higher walls to keep the waters out, this scheme is focused on slowing the flow of the water, reduce its volume during peak flow and building flood storage areas. The EA believes that the answer also lies in constructing stronger properties and infrastructure in the future along with natural prevention through planting trees to slow the flow of waters and creating more areas where the water can soak into the ground.

Needing to up sticks?

Unfortunately, the EA anticipates that the threat of flooding simply cannot be prevented or mitigated for some properties, in which the best course of action would be to move to a safer area. While this may seem sensical for some, it’s not that simple for families and businesses are tied to a property in a high-flood-risk area.

If you’ve had problems with flooding in the past and are now struggling to find affordable insurance—or a willing insurer—the team at Adultsure can help. We can help to find you cover designed specifically for high-flood-risk areas, which doesn’t cost the earth. Call us on 01924 499182 to find out more.

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Whilst many businesses are increasingly vigilant in amending their work policies to mitigate the risk of cyber-attacks, many still don’t have adequate protective measures against cybercrime in place. In the Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2019, recently published by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), findings suggest that larger business are still more likely to prioritise cybersecurity compared to smaller business and charities. Smaller businesses usually consider themselves to be less of a risk due to their scale, but there is little variation in the number of attacks between small and medium businesses, high-income charities and large businesses.

The rising cost of breaches

Despite the number of targeted attacks with a financial impact decreasing slightly over the last year, the overall costs to those who are affected have risen drastically. Since 2017 when the average direct cost to businesses was £1,380, this figure has now grown to £3,150 in 2019. This amount doesn’t consider recovery costs and long-term costs which both add up to approximately £3,000 on average.

Understanding your costs

The estimated costs of breaches in the past year varied widely across businesses, ranging between £300 and £100,000 across techniques including malware, ransomware, phishing emails and more. Concerns were raised during this survey that company management struggled to predict the full financial impact of a data breach and often failed to assess the bigger picture. For example, whilst ransomware might cost your business £5,000 to restore all your systems, you would also need to account for any company downtime, loss of business incurred from reputational damage and the cost of implementing new systems and structures to ensure the same thing doesn’t happen again.

Protecting your finances

Although the number of large and medium businesses protecting their businesses with cyber insurance has risen in the past year, only 11% of all businesses and 6% of charities have specialised cover in place. What’s more, just over a third of businesses have a board member or trustee with specific responsibility for cybersecurity.It’s important that, regardless of the size or nature of your business or charity, you are fully aware of both the immediate and long-term impact that cybercrime could pose to your operation.

At Adultsure, we’ve worked with many businesses from self-employed to global corporations on their cyber solutions. To help ensure you’re protected, our specialist team can conduct a review of your existing insurance to evaluate whether cyber insurance would benefit your business.

Just call us on (01924) 499182.

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You browse suitable properties. You arrange a viewing. You’re all set. You call the letting agent to discuss the deposit. Before you know it, you must pay a deposit, one month of rent and ‘referencing fees’ before you’re handed the keys.

It can add up to putting down thousands and it’s a story all too familiar for renters, though not for much longer. From 1 June (1 September for Wales), landlords and letting agents will be banned from charging tenant fees for arranging credit checks, inventory checklists and referencing.

What are the fees for?

Lettings fees generally cover a range of services that have become a standard in the world of renting. These might include organising credit checks of the proposed tenants, arranging a guarantor form if necessary, and referencing. Often, the fees also include creating an inventory checklist, having the house professionally cleaned and completing any routine garden maintenance, as well as drawing up the official contract between the tenant and landlord.

On average, these fees are an average £272 per person, a staggering amount given that a credit check costs only a couple of pounds and the contracts are ‘cut and paste’ jobs. One of the key arguments to the Tenants Fees bill, which was finally passed after two years of debate, is that the fees are paid by the tenant, but are not for the tenant.

Generally, the checks are for the benefit of both the landlord and the letting agent as a type of vetting for affordability and suitability.

Which fees are now banned?

As per the Tenant Fees Act, letting agents cannot charge the tenant (or guarantor) anything as a condition of a ‘grant, continuance, assignment, termination or renewal’ of a tenancy agreement.

In practice, this means that they cannot charge for credit checks, inventories, guarantor lists, referencing and administrative charges, professional cleaning or gardening services. Some letting agents require a specific insurance provider to cover contents, but this is no longer the case, either.

What happens now?

For tenants, the change in the law is a relief. They only worry about rent and a protected deposit to put down a house and pay nothing to simply ‘take it off the market’. Whilst one might ponder whether landlords won’t simply charge extra on the first month, the new law ensures this isn’t possible.

For landlords, organising assets will have more importance than ever before. Whilst landlords are unable to recoup these costs through one-time inflated rent, they can simply raise the rent for the duration of the tenancy and may choose to do so.

For landlords with a portfolio of owned properties, they may be inclined to raise the rent slightly for all of their houses, and whilst this may solve some of the issues that landlords have, it doesn’t help letting agents, who often rely on these fees to prosper.

What do letting agents think?

ARLA Propertymark, the UK’s foremost professional letting agent body, does not condone a full ban on letting agent fees. It argues that the fees ensure a safe and smooth passage for renters and is concerned that it may start a domino effect: letting agents will try to recoup the losses through landlords, who will recoup their losses through tenants.

In fact, ARLA’s research commissioned by Capital Economics found some crushing figures. It predicted that tenants will pay an increased rent of £103 per year and highlighted the 58,000 jobs residential lettings bring equate to employee taxes of £400 million each year. The fees equate to around 20% of the industry’s turnover.

Whether you are a tenant, a landlord or a letting agent, things are set to change in the coming months. Our relationships with leading insurers mean that we can help you with a tailored policy built to protect you no matter what.

Get in touch with the team on 01924 499182 to find out more.

The post What does the Tenant Fees Act mean for landlords and for tenants? appeared first on Adultsure.

Did you know we are more than just an Adult Industry Insurer?

In the UK there are over 15 million people with long-standing health conditions who are finding it increasingly difficult to source affordable travel insurance. This figure is expected to rise to 18 million in the next decade.

Why is it so difficult to source affordable travel insurance?

There is an all-around lack of understanding amongst a number of insurance companies about the risks surrounding pre-existing medical conditions and their severity. This can result in companies making gross overestimates when setting the premium amount in these cases or even outright refusing to provide the traveller with cover. The information about any alternative cover is not being made readily available to the public, which means a number of people are not seeking out specialist insurers who would be able to assess their pre-existing condition in more depth in order to devise a fair quote.The uncertainty surrounding pre-existing medical conditions also means that even people who have undergone preventative treatment or have been given the ‘all clear’ may still be penalised, despite currently having a clean bill of health. There are many people who are at very low/no risk of being affected by their past illness yet they’re still being quoted unreasonably high premiums.

What does this mean for travellers?

Travellers with pre-existing medical conditions may often feel forced to travel without insurance, leaving them with no protection on their trip. These individuals can feel like they’re uninsurable or that they’re being victimised for having lived with medical conditions. Some may feel pressured to omit the details of their conditions when taking out a policy, which could invalidate their policy completely should they get caught out.

What’s being done about it?

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is now making a stand and have declared that they will work with others in the insurance industry to direct those met with high premiums to specialist insurers. The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has made it clear that the insurance industry is doing all it can to help people with pre-existing medical conditions to find appropriate cover.

Specialist insurers and brokers can ask precise questions about pre-existing health conditions to determine the risk they currently pose to the traveller so the level of cover and the premium can accurately and, most importantly, fairly, reflect this.

If you are looking for travel insurance with a pre-existing or current health condition, we can help you get the cover you need at a competitive price. Call Helen or Steph on our specialist team at Adultsure today on 01924 499182.

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When we last attended the show in 2017 we spoke to many of you attending. There were plenty of questions about the adult industry and what type of products we have to offer. Since the last show we have seen great growth in the industry and we hope this year we can bring our knowledge and customer service to assist with any queries you may have.

We offer impartial advice, top quality cover and rates that rival the faceless internet competition.

We have found many of our clients have struggled to find the correct cover to fit their business needs, so we took our time, did our homework and are confident we now have a super range of insurance to cover all the niche markets, providing the right products to all businesses from clubs, to spas and retailers to manufacturers.

If you have a business in the adult industry and would like a no obligation, hassle free quotation, log your renewal date with us today and we will contact you around 30 days before your policy is due, to run through our service. If your policy is due within 30 days, we will contact you on the same working day to arrange a suitable time to take some details.

Please do visit our product pages here, alternatively, if you require a quote now, please call 01924 499182 or email info@adultsure.uk and one of our specialists will be happy to help.

If you’re attending the show and see our stand please pop in and say hello! One of our specialists will be more than happy to help and answer any queries regarding your insurance needs.

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