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What is Medical Malpractice for Beauty Professionals?

Liability Insurance Professional Indemnity Insurance Medical Malpractice Insurance Beautician and Hairdresser Insurance

Are you a beauty therapist, day spa or hairdresser offering beauty treatments? Making your clients feel amazing is what you do best, so what happens if your client has a reaction to that peel, or you accidentally burn them during a laser treatment?

Your Public Liability insurance is not enough to protect you against treatment claims as many insurers apply treatment risk exclusions on standard liability for beauty occupations. You need a special kind of Professional Indemnity Insurance called Medical Malpractice, which is geared specifically for beauty professionals, that will protect you from legal claims brought against you by your clients for any errors and or omissions as a result of your treatments and services.

What are some of the benefits of Medical Malpractice for beauty professionals?

In addition to the standard coverage for legal costs and compensation for damages, there are a number of benefits included in most beauty Medical Malpractice policies. Many offer no excess, complimentary free legal advice, PR costs etc.

What is a retroactive date?

Medical Malpractice insurance is a Claims Made cover which means that you have to have this insurance in place at the time the claim is notified to you. This could be well after the date the injury or negligence actually occurred.

A retroactive date is the date that the policy cover commences and is normally the date the policy was first started (or incepted).

In the case of unlimited retroactive dates, the insurer is saying they will cover any claims that are notified to you that occurred before you took out the insurance policy, as long as you weren’t aware of them at the time you took it out.

An example of a limited retroactive date, and an unlimited retroactive date;

Company XYZ purchased Medical Malpractice for the first time from 01/07/2010. They weren’t aware of any incidents or events that might become a claim at this time. A former client comes to them on 20/11/2010 while the policy was active, and alleges the chemical treatment they had in March 2010 (before cover was purchased), has resulted in an injury and they hold Company XYZ responsible.

If the policy had a limited retroactive date of the date the cover was incepted (01/07/2020), this claim would not be covered as the cover starts on the retroactive date in this case and the incident occurred prior to this date.If the policy had an unlimited retroactive date, the policy would respond assuming Company XYZ was not aware of this incident prior to 01/07/2010, and a claim would be accepted.

This illustrates how important an unlimited retroactive date is in health and beauty professions!

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This illustrates how important an unlimited retroactive date is in health and beauty professions!

Can I combine my Public Liability insurance with Medical Malpractice?

Yes! There are a number of insurers who provide this special cover and they all include Public Liability in the package. It’s not only more cost effective, it ensures that your three liability exposures (public, products and professional) are all covered by the same insurer who understands the unique circumstances of your profession.

Finding the right Medical Malpractice cover for your beauty business is easy when you have a broker who understands you and your business inside-out. Give me a call to discuss what cover you need to protect you properly.

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General Advice Warning: This advice is general and does not take into account your objectives, financial situation or needs. You should consider whether the advice is appropriate for you and your personal circumstances. Before you make any decision about whether to acquire a certain product, you should obtain and read the relevant product disclosure statement.

All information above has been provided by the author.

Laura Meyer, MeyerInsure, ABN 87 340 928 486, AFSL 233750

This article originally appeared on MeyerInsure Blog and has been published here with permission.