Public Liability for private road

iguana987

Hi

I've accidentally become joint owner of a private road and we need to get public liability insurance. One of the owners in particular is getting particularly worried about how urgent this is as we might get sued.

Does anyone have any tips or recommendations? We don't want to spend a fortune, we'll most likely never need it (like all insurance!) but I've seen prices from under £100 to ten times that. What do I need? What do I need to beware of?

foxy-stoat

You can buy the insurance, google it and you will get a couple of brokers but do you actually need it?

If it was me I would call my buildings insurer or whoever I had the legal cover with and check if it covers defense of a civil claim on the private road. For the other side to win in court they need to prove negligence - but the real winners will be the £100 an hour solicitors fees.

System

foxy-stoat wrote: »

For the other side to win in court they need to prove negligence - but the real winners will be the £100 an hour solicitors fees.

Which might be failure to repair a pothole after reasonable notification?
Tree falling down - is there a schedule of periodic inspection by a qualified person?

Satansallsmiles

I'd call a specialist property insurance broker - Which to be honest would be most of them - They'd be able to give you advice on this.

For small amounts of land minimum premiums would generally between £100 and £500 annually.

If the road is connected to / in front of your property, I'd talk to your buildings / contents insurer in the first instance, as the land may well be included in your existing coverage, or could be added once you advise them of it.

foxy-stoat

Clifford_Pope wrote: »

Which might be failure to repair a pothole after reasonable notification?
Tree falling down - is there a schedule of periodic inspection by a qualified person?

Indeed....are there any trees and how many potholes are on your private road and have you got a system for notifications from other users?

joanneharris

Myself and my OH both have separate liability policies through the same company for our businesses. I've seen them advertising private road insurance on their website before. They are really good for our business liability insurance but no idea what they are like for road liability but maybe worth a look.

P.S. We get our liability insurance in case we injure people or damage things while we work. I'm not sure how this works with roads but reading above I would guess people tripping over on the road would be a big worry.