If you run a construction company, nobody needs to explain risk to you: scaffolding, machinery, deep excavations, changing sites – and people doing physical work day after day. Here, group insurance is not an abstract perk but a safety net shaped to the reality of the work, with a strong accident focus.
Why do the accident elements play the lead role?
Work at height, lifting and material handling, hand-held and heavy machinery, site conditions in winter and summer – together they draw a risk picture in which an accident is the most realistic scenario. The centre of gravity of a construction package is therefore typically: accidental disability with a proportional benefit – permanent impairment is the biggest existential stake –, bone fracture benefit, accidental death, hospital daily benefit and a sick-pay supplement for the weeks of lost work. The payout is a fixed sum and can be used freely: utilities, loan instalments, the family's everyday costs. The office part of the team – site management, design, administration – can be handled in the same contract with its own classification.
Occupational classification: why does the insurer ask?
For a quote, insurers typically need an anonymised job structure: how many people work in physical roles, whether there is work at height or machine operation, and how large the office background is. The classification affects the premium and the availability of some covers, so it pays to state it precisely – a classification "prettier" than reality backfires at claim time. The good news is that the essence of the group format remains: enrolment typically happens without individual medical underwriting, via list-based data – and any insured person's declarations go directly to the insurer, so the employer never learns any health data. Our article on occupational risks gives a fuller picture.
Working hours or around the clock?
Accident cover is typically available in two variants: for work-related accidents only, or for 24 hours a day, private life included. The working-hours version typically costs less; the 24-hour version says more as a benefit: the weekend football match and the ladder at home are covered too. Which one fits your company depends on the goal – weighed between the budget and the message of care. The packages page shows how an accident-focused tier is built.
And the subcontractors?
In construction, some of the people on site are often not employees but subcontractors. Involving them is not ruled out from the start, but it is a separate question: typically the contractual relationship and the group definition set out in the policy decide who can be insured. We walked through the options and alternatives in the article on subcontractors – worth clarifying before you request quotes.
A realistic situation – as an illustration
A member of a bricklaying crew missteps coming off the lowest scaffold level: broken ankle, surgery, weeks out of work. In that moment the bone fracture benefit, the surgery benefit, the hospital daily benefit and the sick-pay supplement together provide fixed-sum support – the conditions of payment are always defined by the given insurer's policy conditions, and filing is fastest on the insurer's own claims channel. The story is invented; the situation is very real.
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