How to Budget for Florida Commercial Insurance

You need to be a responsible business owner, and this means having commercial insurance in Florida. The mistake that many businesses make is not adding a line item in their budget for insurance. This means that you could run into significant problems down the road.

Having commercial insurance is not an option. It is required or most industries. Additionally, it’s going to provide you with a lot of financial protection. If your business is broken into, vandalized, or there is a natural disaster that affects the property, you will want to be able to file a claim. Otherwise, your business could end up going bankrupt with all of the bills that follow.

Compare Quotes

Before you can ever start to budget for commercial insurance in Florida, you have to know what the cost is going to be. This means you will want to take the time to compare quotes from multiple companies that write policies in the state. It’s not something that has to be done individually. You can call and insurance agent and have them do the work for you. They will contact the companies, get the quotes, and talk to you about the various coverage options.

The added benefit of working with an agent is that they can help you to determine all of the coverage you need to protect your business. They may also be able to get you discounts based upon the industry you are in as well as other individual circumstances.

Write a Budget

Once you know the cost of commercial insurance, you can start to write your budget. Even as you develop a business plan, you will want to incorporate insurance premiums. For example, if you are asking for a loan from the bank, they are going to want the every dollar you plan on spending – and it insurance premiums are included, they may reject your business plan altogether.

You need to have a budget for your business anyway. This includes itemizing all of your expenses, as well as your revenue.

Appropriate Your Funds

Your funds need to be appropriated based upon the required expenses you have going out. This may include a building lease, electricity, Internet, IT services, as well as insurance. Once you identify these expenses, you can start to appropriate other funds, such as marketing, added payroll, and more.

If you can’t afford insurance, you shouldn’t be going into business. It is a requirement for you to have, and it may be the difference between you being able to get customers or not. No one wants to work with a company that is an insured because then they take on the liability. If you plan on getting a loan to cover you for the first couple months of being in business, you want to consider premiums as well. If you have to increase your loan to account for this or increase your required revenue on a monthly basis, it has to be done. Leaving insurance premiums out of the budget is not an acceptable business solution.