Lofts, drains and chemicals
A pest controller's day might start in a restaurant kitchen, move to a farm and end in a cramped loft full of wasps. You climb ladders, crawl under floors and handle rodenticides and insecticides. Stings, bites, falls and chemical exposure are all part of the job.
Professional training and safe-use certificates for pesticides help you work well, and an insurer may ask about the chemicals you use and any work at height such as bird proofing on roofs.
Some technicians specialise in fumigation, which uses more hazardous products, or in wildlife management on farms and estates. Each specialism changes the questions an insurer asks. Name your main tasks rather than relying on the job title alone.
On the road between jobs
Many technicians cover a large patch, spending hours each day in the van. That brings driving risk and long sitting periods between bursts of physical work. If you run your own business, the van, kit and stock are paid for by you.
Employed technicians at larger firms may get company sick pay for a period, then statutory sick pay. Self-employed operators lose income straight away, along with contracts if customers need someone else to step in.
Commercial contracts with food businesses often need regular visits. If you cannot attend, a client may move to another provider, so a long absence can cost future income as well as current jobs.
- Self-employed: plan for no sick pay
- Employed: check the length of company sick pay
- Include van costs in the benefit you need
Rating a varied job
Insurers group occupations into risk classes. Pest control mixes driving, light manual work and occasional heights, so insurers place it in different ways. That affects your premium and whether the claim test is own occupation or suited occupation.
Bird proofing and roof work can change the picture. Be clear about how often you do it, so the insurer rates you correctly from the start.
Rats and birds can carry diseases such as leptospirosis, and protective kit lowers the risk. Income protection pays for illness as well as injury, so a serious infection that kept you off work would be assessed like any other claim.
Life cover and your business
If you employ staff or have a business partner, business protection may matter as well as personal cover. For your own family, a term policy sized to your mortgage and their needs is a sensible starting point, and putting it in trust helps it pay out quickly.
If you are employed, check whether your company offers death in service and how many times salary it pays. Personal cover can top it up.
Self-employed operators have no workplace benefit at all, so a personal policy is the only life cover in place unless you arrange something through a limited company.
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