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Industry Practice · Commerce & hospitality

Restaurants & QSR Chains

Insurance for restaurants, QSR chains and cloud kitchens, kitchen fire, food-borne illness, employee injury and high-volume cash handling.

Kitchen fire & equipment damageFood-borne illnessEmployee injury
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The sector

The kitchen is the asset; the food is the liability.

Restaurant operators carry property risk concentrated in the kitchen, food-borne illness exposure that crosses into product-liability territory, and high cash and stock throughput that creates employee dishonesty exposure. QSR chains additionally face brand-reputational risk from a single-outlet incident across the entire franchise network.

Risk profile

Where the exposure lives.

Restaurants face fire, public liability, equipment breakdown and interruption exposure. We scope these four first.

01
Kitchen fire & equipment damage
Hot-cooking environments, oil fires and gas leaks, kitchens account for the majority of restaurant fire claims.
02
Food-borne illness
Customer claims for food poisoning or allergen exposure, plus regulatory penalties under FSSAI.
03
Employee injury
Burns, cuts and slip-and-fall in confined kitchen environments. EC Act applies regardless of voluntary cover.
04
Cash & stock dishonesty
High daily cash throughput and stock pilferage, fidelity cover addresses both.
Recommended cover

The programme we typically place.

Each cover below is a link to the policy page. The combination, the limits and the wording are what we negotiate on your behalf.

01
Fire & Burglary
Restaurant package with kitchen-fire, equipment and stock cover.
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02
Public Liability
Combined PL with food-borne illness and product-liability extensions.
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03
Workmen Compensation
EC Act cover for kitchen and service staff.
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04
Fidelity Insurance
Employee dishonesty cover sized to daily cash receipts and stock value.
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Claim reality

What a claim tends to look like here.

The typical claim is a kitchen fire or equipment breakdown that stops service, with food-stock spoilage and a possible public-liability claim from a customer. For a chain, one outlet's loss also affects the brand.

Questions

Questions we get in this sector.

Deterioration-of-stock cover pays for perishable stock spoiled by a covered breakdown or power failure, subject to conditions. We add it where fresh stock is a material value.
Product and public liability can respond to third-party claims arising from food served, subject to the wording. We confirm the food-borne illness position rather than assuming standard public liability includes it.
Yes, and specifically the cooking line and the extraction duct. Grease accumulation in ducting is the classic cause of a serious restaurant fire, and duct cleaning records affect both the terms available and how a claim is examined.
Public liability responds to injury to visitors, which in a restaurant most often means slips and falls rather than anything dramatic. It is the section that is actually used, and it is regularly set at a token limit.
That is business interruption, and for a single-outlet restaurant it usually exceeds the physical damage. Rent, staff and loan instalments continue while there is no revenue, and the indemnity period should cover the time to win customers back, not just to refit.

Need a sector-specific risk review?

Speak with an advisor who has arranged cover for restaurants before.

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