Hospitality venues are among the most operationally complex and risk-exposed environments in the UK - yet the sector has often been overlooked by insurers. That’s the verdict of Mike Dickinson (pictured), regional director, Acrisure, who stressed the need for renewed attention on these complex venues.
“COVID had a big impact on insurance for hospitality and leisure-related businesses,” he said. “A lot of people pulled out of the market because of COVID and all the insurance implications that came with it. So, there are a lot of mainstream insurers who won’t get involved.” For Dickinson, this means that client relations with brokers become all the more important.
Dickinson stressed the importance of the physical presence of the broker when dealing with the hospitality sector. “It's firstly understanding what it is that the client wants and needs,” he said. “And the only way to do it is to get out and go and see. You can't really do it sitting behind a desk. You have to get under the skin of what they do.”
He added that there is a need to make sure each venue is treated individually, rather than just using off-the-shelf policies: “You really need to understand what's going on through proper risk assessments, understanding the construction of it.. it's really all about getting that information over to the insurers in a way that enables them to underwrite.”
Dickinson also believes that client conversations are critical due to the changing nature of these venues. He argued there is the risk of “pigeonholing” and then the venue suddenly diversifies. He emphasised that to tackle this, it is all about keeping the dialogue open: “It's just making sure you keep up-to- date, keep in communication with the clients to make sure that they know what they've got to tell you, so that you can have those conversations with the insurers.”
Potential coverage considerations across hospitality venues include:
Dickinson believes that when it comes to understanding the levels of business interruption coverage needed, it’s about knowing the venue inside out. “What impact a claim on a certain part of a venue might have on the overall operation.. could it still operate?” he said. “Could a cricket ground safely operate if one of the stands got burnt down? Would the other three still be open whilst it’s being rebuilt?”
Dickinson argued it is also about knowing specifically how they make their profit. “It’s understanding where their loss of profit will come from. You could still operate with staff and people coming through the gate, but you might not be able to provide them with hospitality, or you might not be able to provide them with a food offering.”
To manage operational resilience and business continuity, brokers should also consider:
According to UKHospitality’s report from 2024, “84% of hospitality businesses experienced increased insurance costs year-on-year.” One of the key challenges outlined by Dickinson is having access to insurance and getting competitive rates. He argued: “It can be difficult to get what you want, or get what the client thinks they could in terms of premiums and cover.”
Underwriting can be another huge challenge for large hospitality venues. According to Dickinson, “it comes down to construction of the buildings, and things like the risk assessments and understanding how they manage large volumes of people.”
There is also the issue of the underestimation of cyber. According to Dickinson: “We're having conversations with clients all the time about that, and it's still a bit of a challenge to get clients to totally understand.” According to a 2025 Government cyber report: “Businesses in the food or hospitality sector (25%) and the retail or wholesale sector (27%) were less likely than businesses overall (42%) to have sought external information or guidance.”
Brokers can support the understanding of hospitality risks by:
