What Type of Insurance Should an Esthetician Have?
Estheticians know their way around making their clients look and feel their best with the latest in skin care regimens and techniques. Utilizing this knowledge helps estheticians earn a reputation and build a solid client base. Just as important as an esthetician's skillsets is the liability insurance that allows them to practice what they love with confidence.
In today’s deep-dive, we’ll look at what types of insurance estheticians should have and how to spot a policy that’s specifically tailored for beauty professionals.
Liability Insurance Coverage Every Estheticians Needs
Liability insurance is the basis for coverage as it pertains to the most common risks. In essence, these are the “base” coverages any esthetician insurance policy worth its weight should include and provide generous coverage limits for. Limits are set based on the risks that face estheticians everyday in order to provide an adequate safety net for the unexpected.
Professional Liability Insurance for Estheticians
One of the most common types of insurance for estheticians pertains to professional liability. That’s because professional liability are all the risks you face from actually providing skin care sessions. There’s a million and one accidents that can happen with skin care, even to the most experienced estheticians, that’s why this coverage type should be at the top of your list. Since claims related to professional liability have to do with the services provided, you’ll also hear this coverage called “malpractice insurance”.
General Liability Insurance for Estheticians
General liability insurance is also vital since it pertains to accidents or property damages that occur in and around your place of business. The slip and fall lawyer’s ads on TV have made general liability insurance a necessity as soon as you open your doors for business. These types of injuries are what gave general liability coverage the nickname of “slip and fall insurance”.
Product Liability Insurance for Estheticians
Rounding out the top three liability coverages is product liability insurance. Especially with estheticians, you're using a whole host of different products on your clients skin to produce the desired result. When a client has an adverse reaction, they can hold you responsible. Product liability insurance covers you from the costs of the claim and even provides legal defense fees if they become necessary.
However, even with the stellar protection that general liability, professional liability, and product liability insurance provides, you should still have additional safeguards. Other real-life risks facing estheticians could produce significant financial burdens when not appropriately protected against.
That’s why Elite Beauty Society includes the following additional coverage as part of our all-encompassing esthetician liability insurance policy:
- Identity Theft Protection: today’s estheticians are more reliant than ever before on the web for conducting various facets of their business. Unfortunately, a greater web presence makes you an easier target for cybercriminals. Identity theft can be incredibly costly and time consuming to repair, so we choose to include all the way up to $25,000 in identity restoration services with our esthetician insurance policies.
When you combine this full list of defenses tailored for today’s actively-practicing estheticians, you get one of the very best all-around insurance programs available. But don’t stop with coverage alone, we’ll show you everything else you need to examine to find the perfect policy for your unique circumstances.
Examples of What Esthetician Insurance Covers
Getting a good overview of the difference liability coverages, as well as other protections that make up an all-encompassing policy are great, but seeing how these coverages work will give you a much better understanding of what liability insurance for estheticians actually provides.
Let’s run through some scenarios where esthetician insurance can literally save a career in beauty:
- General liability - a regular is walking back to your booth when they slip on a little bit of wax residue from an earlier session. Their impact is hard enough to cause serious injuries which require immediate medical attention. They decide to hire a lawyer to sue for all of their medical bills, lost wages, attorneys fees, and other costs. General liability insurance with EBS provides $2 million for each occurrence, up to a $3 million individual annual aggregate.
- Professional liability - while providing an eyebrow waxing for a client, the removal causes skin lifting. The injury is severe enough to cause permanent scarring and pigmentation. The client holds the esthetician responsible for all of the costs related to their injuries and their ensuing medical care. EBS’s professional liability insurance provides up to $2 million for each claim, up to a $3 million individual annual aggregate.
- Product liability - you’re giving an illuminating facial treatment which uses an array of antioxidants, nutritional serums, and essential oils. A certain compound in one of these products causes a severe allergic reaction in your client, which requires emergency medical care. You later receive notice they plan to file suit for their ambulatory costs, medical care, lost wages from missing work, and other costs related to their injury. Product liability insurance from EBS also comes with a stout limit of $2 million in total coverage.
These scenarios are unfortunately all-too-common examples of the types of risks facing estheticians simply by providing services. That’s why having a solid esthetician insurance policy from the get-go is your best bet for a great career in the business of beauty.
The Difference Between Occurrence Form & Claims Made Policies
A really important distinction when it comes to different estheticians insurance programs out there is whether they use claims-made or occurrence form policies.
The industry-preferred type of insurance for estheticians is an occurrence form which says your policy can be expired and you can still go back and file a claim for an event that happened during your term. Claims-made is the opposite, saying the policy has to be active to file a claim. So what’s the big deal? It all comes down to timing.
Say you’re providing a facial on the last day your policy is active and then weeks later, when your policy is now expired, you get notice your client was injured and demanding compensation.
With occurrence form policies, you can still file a claim since the event occurred when the policy was active. With claims-made, since the policy would have expired by the time the claim came about, you’d more than likely be left paying all of the claim out-of-pocket.
Maximizing the Value of Your Esthetician Insurance
Great coverage options with solid limits for each coverage type is awesome and something you definitely need in an esthetician insurance policy.
But to truly get a great value for what you’re spending, you need additional benefits. That’s why we include a whole library of free, professionally-curated content, a free website, discounts and deals from leading names in beauty, free access to continuing education, and even a free annual magazine subscription.
Looking at How Much Esthetician Insurance Costs
Diversity of options when it comes to how much esthetician insurance costs is the best way to get a policy that meets your needs and fits your unique circumstances.
EBS knows no two careers are exactly the same, so offers a plethora of options for paying for insurance, including:
- One Year Professional Policy (Full Time): $169 up front or as low as $15.49 when financed.
- One Year Professional Policy (Part Time): $135 up front or as low as $12.38 when financed.
- Two Year Professional Policy: $279.95 today or as low as $25.66 per month when financed for 12 months.
- One Year Esthetician Student Policy: just $49 for an entire year of coverage.
- Benefits Only Plan (Excluding Insurance): $39 for those that want access to all of the great benefits we offer, just without the addition of an insurance plan.
You can even add specialized services like microblading onto your policy for only $499.
Comparing Esthetician Liability Insurance
Taking the time to compare esthetician insurance programs can really help you save money and get a policy that’s right for you. But the process of back and forth clicking and different terms can get tedious fast.
That’s why we put our program and our competitors side-by-side right on our site in an easy-to-read format.
How to Sign Up for Liability Insurance in Minutes
We like to be really upfront from the get-go with what you’re getting and for how much. Signing up is easy too. Simply fill out a quick application and check out and you’ll enjoy immediate coverage.