What insurance do I need as a PC repair tech?

[ArcticFox]

I'd like to go into repairing home computers and doing consultation from my residence, and I thought you needed insurance when you do something like this. As in when you screw up and you're working on a client's PC and need to replace a part or data.

Sorry to be so breif I'm sick and don't feel like posting a bunch.

[Bovon]

You should chat with an insurance agent to advise you of all of the various inclusions available. Liability is a no brainer. Bear in mind that there will be a deductable...say, $50 to $100 bucks, so the insurance company picks up after you have coughed up the deductible (they may pay you upfront, but only minus the deductible).

If you will be working from your home, better check with the city/county/subdivision rules..they may have a restriction on any home/work place.

[Gettinbye]

Somethng else you can do is establish your business as an LLC (Limited-Liability Company). This will protect you better than registering as a corporation (until/unless you grow to the point that you're forced to incorporate), as well as giving you other insurance options.

[M_Six]

A lot depends on how much site work you'll be doing. If you're working in your own home, you'll have liability for the PC itself and the data that's on it. The cost of the PC is easy enough to determine, but the cost of the data if it's lost is tougher to get a handle on. Liability insurance is fairly inexpensive, though. A $1 million umbrella policy (covers everything) is a few hundred per year.

On-site work gets a little more involved because things like fires caused by overloaded circuits could get blamed on you. Also someone hacking into a system you set up and stealing or corrupting data could also get blamed on you. CYA is the first rule.

[HeadBand]

it would be nice if you had injury on the job insurance or whatever its called...mainly for like constructionworkers/plumbers and stuff but it would give them peace of mind that you wont turn around and sue them if you fall over your own two feet

[ArcticFox]

OK, to clarify, replacing a mobo you fried isn't *that* big of a deal, I could pay that out of pocket. But if for some reason personal data was lost, how would I deal with that? If I do go into this type of business, the first thing I would do is buy some large hard drives and a duplicator, and back up every byte of a client's data before working on the machine. That way, if something happened to their My Documents folder (say, a picture of an iMac infected it and no one could stand going in and getting back the Word files), I could just slap in their drive and restore all their data.

Same with me playing hot potato with their 200GB Western Digital and having it fail.

Does that hard drive backup scheme sound logical? I remember not too long ago I decided to upgrade my mom's 700Mhz Duron/98se machine with Win2k, and then the mobo got fried in the process and had to be replaced. No idea why, but it happened. I had all her data on CD-Rs (save for the many custom fonts she somehow obtained) so nothing vital was lost, but it still wasn't any fun for her to pay $150 for something that should have never happened in the first place.

[PeterGriffin]

Nice topic!

I'm preparing to go into the same line of work and these are the same issues that I have been thinking about as well. It is kinda scary to think of all the liability that could be force upon you when repairing/upgrading/installing a pc!

[John Prophet]

data?

insurance= norton ghost

[ArcticFox]

Why? Going into a private PC tech would give me a reason to buy expensive toys, like hard drive duplicators, Senfu TechStations, and POST cards.

[Gettinbye]

Originally posted by ArcticFox

Does that hard drive backup scheme sound logical?

Quite logical. I personally don't trust CD/DVD backups as they are less reliable (IMO) than direct HDD copy. I use an 8-to-1 stand-alone drive copier myself to create 2 backups (overkill, I know) to back a client's data before I begin any system-altering work. It has saved my butt on more than one occasion (three, if memory serves). Additionally, I usually keep this data on file for a period of 3 months, at which point I format the drives and cycle them into the next "back-up batch". It's a little bit of an initial investment in HDDs, but you can write them off come tax time