When you run a GP practice it is not the same as running, say, an antique shop. If you own an antique shop and are unfortunate enough to go sick for a month, the worst that can happen is that you have no income for that month. But you can just put a notice on the door telling customers that you are off sick and will be back at whatever time you think. Even if you have a customer who sees something in the window that he or she wants, they will come back for it when you re-open.
However, you cannot put a notice on your surgery door saying the same thing to patients. When they visit your surgery because they are not well, they can’t wait for you to come back in a month’s time because they need to see a doctor now and get a prescription or whatever else they need.
This means that you have to hire a locum in order to ensure that your patients can get the treatment that they need when they need it. Unfortunately, locums are not cheap. According to the Medeconomics survey of GP locum earnings in the UK, undertaken in August 2020, the cost of hiring locums in some areas is now over £1,000 a day! It seems unbelievable, yet that is what the survey found. That is a cost that will make a big dent in the income of any GP practice.
If key members of your practice become unwell, or if they have an accident and need time to recover, the problem is that they could be away and unable to work for weeks or even months. With a lot of issues, there is no way of knowing how long the recovery time is going to be. Not only that but if you have a large practice with 20 or 30 staff members, there is always the chance that Murphy’s Law will come into play. If you are not familiar with it, it states that whatever can go wrong will go wrong. In this case, it is likely to mean that while you have one staff member off sick, another one will probably go down as well, so now you need two locums to cover everything!
Then there is not just the issue of people going sick or having an accident. For instance, you could have a key member of your practice called for jury service. Sure, it might be just for a week, but then again it could equally be one of those trials that drag on for months and months. Murphy’s Law again. There could also be an instance of a suspension for some reason or other, which again is something that is unable to be foreseen.
All of these issues can be covered with the locum insurance for GPs that we provide at Approachable Locum Insurance. Our insurance plans can all be tailored to your exact needs because no two practices have exactly the same needs, so our plans are flexible.
As a specialist in the medical insurance market, we understand it better than a general insurance broker, and so we know the sort of issues that can occur.
A typical policy will include cover for accident or illness, medical and hospital expenses, funeral expenses, jury service, compassionate leave, maternity and paternity benefit, cover for someone who is suspended, revalidation, and even delayed return from holiday – which is quite likely just at the present time with countries being put on amber and red lists.
However, we can add or subtract any of these benefits so that they exactly fit your requirements.
