A handyman is insured on a LIST, not on a job title, and that is the whole difficulty of the trade. The work is deliberately varied: a shelf one morning, a tap washer at lunchtime, a flat pack and a bit of decorating in the afternoon. An insurer cannot rate variety in the abstract, so it rates the activities you declared, and anything outside them is usually outside the cover.
The declared work list is the policy
Handyman wordings carry a schedule of permitted activities, commonly framed as minor works up to a stated value or excluding specified trades. Read it as the definition of your business rather than as small print: fitting a kitchen, working above a stated height, tiling a roof or laying a floor may each sit outside it. Where the work you actually do has grown past the list, the answer is to have the list changed rather than to hope.
Where gas and electrics stop
Gas work is restricted by law to Gas Safe registered engineers, and notifiable electrical work in dwellings falls under Part P with a competent person scheme as the practical route. A handyman policy almost always excludes both unless the registration is held and declared. Changing a tap is not gas work; moving a boiler flue is, and the distinction is legal rather than a matter of confidence.
Damage to the thing you were working on
General public liability commonly excludes property in your care, custody or control, which for a handyman is the door being rehung or the unit being assembled. A treatment or custody extension answers for it and carries its own, lower, limit. For a trade whose claims are mostly small and mostly about the item itself, that extension matters more than the headline liability figure.
Tools, and the van
Tools sections are rated on a declared total with a single item limit, and a handyman's kit is wide rather than deep, which usually suits the standard limits. The conditions are the usual ones and are worth reading: locked van, overnight parking at home or in a compound, and sometimes a requirement to remove tools overnight altogether, which is the condition most often breached and most often fatal to a claim.
Questions people ask about handyman insurance
What does handyman insurance cover?
Public liability for injury and damage to third parties, employers' liability once anybody is employed, tools cover, and usually an extension for damage to the property you were working on. Cover applies to the activities declared on the schedule.
Can a handyman do electrical or gas work?
Not without the relevant registration. Gas work is restricted by law to Gas Safe registered engineers, and notifiable electrical work in dwellings falls under Part P. Handyman policies normally exclude both unless declared with the registration.
How much public liability does a handyman need?
One or two million pounds covers most domestic work. Letting agents and commercial clients often ask for two million, and site work usually requires five million, so check the work you want rather than the work you do now.
Is there a limit on the value of jobs?
Frequently, yes. Handyman wordings often define minor works by a value ceiling per job or exclude particular trades. It is the first thing to read on the schedule, because exceeding it puts the work outside the cover.