Insurance for security guards

Security is not one occupation to an insurer. A guard monitoring cameras in a control room, a static guard on a commercial site overnight, a door supervisor at a licensed premises, and a cash-in-transit officer present risks that are orders of magnitude apart. The first two are rated fairly lightly. Crowd control and door work are rated heavily because assault is foreseeable rather than exceptional. Cash-in-transit is sometimes restricted outright.

The consequences of an assault are what the insurance conversation should be about. The physical injury is covered by ACC, including treatment and weekly compensation. What follows is often less visible: an inability to work alone, at night, or in the environment where the incident happened. ACC can cover mental injury arising from a specific covered work event, and a serious assault may qualify — but the assessment is individual and the ongoing consequences are not always accepted.

Night work adds a second layer. Sustained night and rotating shifts carry documented long-term associations with cardiovascular and metabolic conditions and with sleep disorders. None of that is an accident, and none of it is covered by ACC.

The third feature is employment. Security is heavily rostered and often casual, with hours that vary week to week and employers that change with contracts. That complicates income protection eligibility and the calculation of any benefit.

The difference between a light rating and a heavy one here is entirely in the description, so it is worth doing carefully.

These are the details that decide whether the cover does what you expected. Read them before you compare on price.

• Which type of security work you have been rated on, and whether it covers everything you actually do.
• The mental health benefit limit in any income protection policy, given the assault risk in the role.
• Whether crowd control or cash-in-transit duties are excluded rather than rated.
• Minimum hours requirements if your roster varies or you work casually.
• Whether night shift has been disclosed and how the insurer treats it.
• Whether trauma or life cover would be better value than income protection on your income.

Every New Zealand insurer writes cover for security work to its own wording, and the words are where the money is. Two policies that look identical on price can pay very differently when it matters. Closing that gap is the entire job of an adviser.

• Security roles are banded very differently, and an accurate description is worth more than a price comparison.
• Mental health limits matter unusually much in a role where assault is a foreseeable event.
• Where hours are casual, an adviser can point to trauma or life cover that does not depend on hours worked.
• Cash-in-transit and crowd control are restricted by some insurers and accepted by others — knowing which is the work.

There are three ways to buy life cover in New Zealand, and they are not equivalent. You can buy direct from one insurer, which means you see one product range and one underwriting appetite. You can buy through your bank, which usually means a single insurer’s product sold under the bank’s brand, often with narrower definitions. Or you can go through an adviser, who quotes several insurers at once and is required to put your interests first.

The premium you pay is the same either way. Insurers build adviser commission into their pricing whether or not an adviser is involved, so going direct does not get you a discount — it just removes the person whose job is to argue your corner at application and at claim time.

• An adviser can see which insurer is currently taking your health history on standard terms, and which one will load or exclude it.
• An adviser can structure cover across two insurers if that produces a better outcome than putting everything with one.
• An adviser handles the underwriting back-and-forth, and is the person who chases the claim when a family is least able to.
• An adviser has to document why the recommendation suits you, which is a written record you can hold them to.

We are a referral service, not an insurer. We do not quote premiums and we do not sell policies. What we do is put you in front of one licensed New Zealand adviser who can compare the market properly.

1. 1

   You tell us what you are looking at

   The form takes about a minute. Nobody asks for your medical history on a web form — that conversation happens with the adviser, properly, and only once you have decided to proceed.

2. 2

   An adviser calls you

   A licensed New Zealand adviser talks through your situation: who depends on you, what you owe, what you already have in place, and what you are actually worried about.

3. 3

   They compare the market

   The adviser quotes across the major insurers, checks which of them will take your health history on the best terms, and puts the options side by side in writing.

4. 4

   You decide, in your own time

   There is no obligation and no cost to you. If the answer is that you already have enough cover, a good adviser will tell you that.