Delivery Driver and Food Delivery Insurance

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Note: Inexperienced food delivery drivers with 0 years of no claims may have difficulty getting quotes in the current market.

The guidance on this site is based on our own analysis and is meant to help you identify options and narrow down your choices. We do not advise or tell you which product to buy; undertake your own due diligence before entering into any agreement. Read our full disclosure here.

Delivery driver insurance can be confusing, that's for certain. There's public liability business insurance to consider, plus you're required by law to get Delivery Driver Hire & Reward insurance for your vehicle.

Without the right vehicle insurance, a delivery driver could be driving illegally—and not just when they're making deliveries. And driving illegally without the right courier insurance can mean potential fines or even seizure of your car. Not to mention the risk to your personal finances if you have an accident and there's vehicle damage or someone is injured or worse.

Self-employed delivery drivers face a particularly tricky situation, especially if they're driving their own vehicle and it happens to be a car (it can be harder to get delivery driver insurance for a car than for a van, for instance). Regardless of whether you drive a van, car or motorbike, this article will explain what you need to know about insurance to protect yourself.

Want delivery insurance? We can help.

Get ANNUAL delivery insurance quotes for your car, motorbike or van.

Get annual quotes

Get SHORT TERM delivery insurance quotes for your van.

Get short-term quotes

Do I need special insurance to be a delivery driver?

Yes, there are two primary types of insurance you could need as a delivery driver, whether you deliver fast food or parcels:

  • Hire & Reward vehicle insurance. Required by law for anyone paid to make deliveries of food or parcels.
  • Public Liability business insurance To protect against accidental damage or injuries to other people when you're working but not behind the wheel.

Hire & reward insurance

Hire & reward is a form of commercial vehicle insurance that a delivery driver needs to have. Regular vehicle insurance will not cover you if you're a delivery driver. Also, 'business use' insurance does not cover delivery driving on its own. A delivery driver needs hire & reward cover (taxis also need this, because they are also paid for driving something/someone from point A to point B).

So, just like you need 'social, domestic & pleasure' to cover your day-to-day personal driving and 'commuting' to cover driving between home and work, a delivery driver needs 'hire & reward' to cover making deliveries.

There are two ways to go about getting hire & reward insurance if your existing insurer won't cover your delivery work:

  • Ask your existing insurer if they'll expand your cover to include hire & reward for delivery driving, or
  • Buy a top-up policy that covers your delivery driving only (and you keep your existing social, domestic & pleasure policy to cover your personal driving), or
  • Buy a new commercial policy that covers both your personal and delivery driving on one policy (and you cancel your existing social, domestic & pleasure policy)

However, the second option won't work for everyone, because a lot of big SD&P insurers won't continue to cover you if you also use your vehicle for deliveries (even if you have separate cover for that).

Does my car insurance cover making deliveries?

No—regular social, domestic & pleasure car insurance does not cover making deliveries. Even if you have 'commuting' or 'business use', these do not cover making deliveries. All delivery drivers need a special type of commercial car insurance to make deliveries called hire & reward. And if you make deliveries without hire & reward insurance, your existing SD&P car insurance provider might invalid your insurance, leaving you uninsured.

Below we'll discuss the insurance ins and outs for delivery drivers driving a delivery vehicle and also their own personal vehicle. Because if you use your personal vehicle for making deliveries and don't get the right delivery insurance, it could actually mean that your social, domestic & pleasure (SD&P) car insurance is invalidated. This would mean you'd be uninsured even for personal driving to go to the shops or see friends.

Public liability insurance

Public liability is a form of business insurance that protects delivery drivers against situations where someone else is injured or their property is damaged—and they blame you. Public liability insurance costs from around £50 for a year and policies are quite easy to find so it's really worth getting a policy.

Where to get it

If you buy your hire & reward insurance from a delivery insurance specialist, they may be able to add public liability insurance onto your package. On the other hand, top-up hire & reward policies are not likely to include public liability insurance. To buy your public liability policy separately or just find out how much it will cost, fill out a short form with our comparison partner QuoteZone.

Do I need it?

Self-employed drivers may need to buy their own public liability policy, but it depends on who you're delivering for. If you're delivering for some of the big apps, they might provide public liability even if you're self employed. For example, Deliveroo covers you for public liability, but JustEat does not. At the time of writing this list was correct but please double check for yourself:

Which delivery drivers need to buy public liability insurance?
Deliveroothey provide public liability cover
JustEatyou'd need to buy your own public liability cover
UberEatsyou'd need to buy your own public liability cover
Amazon Flexyou'd need to buy your own public liability cover
RestaurantEmployees should be covered by the restaurant's public liability—check to be sure
PizzaEmployees should be covered by the pizza place's public liability—check to be sure

Do you deliver for just one restaurant? If you're an employee of a restaurant, their public liability insurance will likely cover you. But ask the restaurant owner or your manager to be sure that the restaurant's public liability cover is set up to cover drivers when they're off premises as well as on.

In addition, you might want a form of personal accident cover to provide you with some money if you're injured on the job and cannot work—this can help you pay your personal bills while you're off work.

Where to get car or van insurance for delivery drivers

You can read more about how to get delivery insurance quotes in our article "How to get delivery driver and food delivery insurance", but here's a quick recap of that information.

If you drive a car, your existing private car insurer is unlikely to cover delivery drivers. But it doesn't hurt to ask. So first, call up your existing social, domestic & pleasure (SD&P) vehicle insurer and ask if they'll expand your coverage to include your delivery driving. Or check out the links below with research for some of the major UK insurers:

If your existing private car insurance provider won't cover your delivery driving, ask if they will keep you covered for SD&P driving and accept having another company like Zego cover your delivery driving. Some insurers find top-up cover acceptable, others don't.

If your existing insurer won't cover your delivery driving and also won't cover your SD&P if you get top-up hire & reward cover, then you'll need to get alternative vehicle insurance from a specialist to cover both your SD&P and your delivery driving. To recap, here are the three options for getting covered as a delivery driver:

  1. Contact current SD&P insurer and ask if they'll cover delivery driving
  2. Buy additional cover like Zego (and keep existing cover for SD&P)
  3. Get a new policy from a specialist to cover SD&P and deliveries (and cancel existing SD&P car insurance)

Vans are typically easier to insure for delivery work than cars, as insurers are more accustomed to doing so.

Whether you drive a car, van or motorbike, you can get a quote from a delivery driver specialist by clicking here to access a search engine powered by our partner QuoteZone. You'll fill out a short quote form then up to three insurance providers will contact you to proceed with the quote and answer any questions you still have.

You MUST do this if you use a top-up cover like Zego

You must contact your existing SD&P insurer if you want to buy top-up delivery driver insurance like Zego in order to inform them of your plan and ensure they will continue to cover your SD&P driving.

Top-up hire & reward insurance for delivery drivers essentially sits on top of your underlying car insurance (which you have for driving to the shops or to see family and friends) and covers your delivery driving work. Using top-up cover means you have vehicle insurance from two insurers—one for SD&P driving and another for delivery driving. If you go this route, you MUST confirm with your SD&P insurer that they find this scenario acceptable—if they say no, you can't go with this option.

Many SD&P insurers will stop covering you if you do any delivery driving, even if you have top-up cover. If your insurer won't work with top-up cover and won't cover delivery driving, then doing so would invalidate your insurance. This means you'd be driving uninsured.

What happens if I make deliveries without hire & reward insurance?

If you are paid to make deliveries of food, parcels or anything else and you do not have suitable delivery or courier insurance coverage in place (i.e., hire & reward cover) then it is likely your existing car insurance provider will invalidate your insurance when they find out—which essentially means you are driving uninsured.

The penalties for driving uninsured can be severe. Here are a few options the police and court have to penalize an uninsured driver/car owner:

  • A fixed penalty of £300 or and unlimited fine
  • 6 penalty points
  • Disqualification from driving
  • Seizure of the vehicle
  • Destruction of the vehicle

What insurance is needed for specific jobs like Just Eat, Deliveroo, UberEats?

Your insurance requirements will vary depending on which company you're making deliveries for. Each company provides a different level of underlying cover to their drivers, so it's critical to learn about the app or company you're working with to find out what they cover and what insurance you'll need to source on your own. Read more in our in-depth articles for different apps below:

FAQs

Food delivery drivers are required by law to have a form of commercial vehicle insurance called Hire & Reward; in addition, food delivery drivers should have a common type of business insurance called public liability insurance. Food delivery drivers who are employees might be covered under their restaurant's public liability policy but self-employed delivery drivers who want that protection would need to buy their own public liability policy. Prices start around £50 a year.

You can buy temporary, pay-as-you-go top-up food delivery insurance from companies like Zego IF your existing car insurer allows this. See this list of car insurance companies that allow top-up cover here.

Finding delivery driver jobs shouldn't be too tricky. Services like Amazon Flex UK allow you to sign-up through the app, while others such as JustEat have a website you can easily apply through.

If you're looking for Tesco delivery driver jobs, Morrisons delivery driver jobs, Dominos delivery driver jobs (or the like), your best bet is a quick Google search and to head straight to their websites.

Many of the UK's courier and delivery workforce are considered self-employed, and have been so for a long time. While most apps and employers are keen to keep things this way, things might be changing sooner than later—the Supreme Court ruled in March 2021 that Uber must offer its drivers basic employment rights as part of their contracts.

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  • Note: Inexperienced food delivery drivers with 0 years of no claims may have difficulty getting a quote in the current market.
Erin Yurday

Erin Yurday is the Founder and Editor of NimbleFins. Prior to NimbleFins, she worked as an investment professional and as the finance expert in Stanford University's Graduate School of Business case writing team. Read more on LinkedIn.

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The guidance on this site is based on our own analysis and is meant to help you identify options and narrow down your choices. We do not advise or tell you which product to buy; undertake your own due diligence before entering into any agreement. Read our full disclosure here.