NHSLA - Cover for volunteers

Scheme coverage for volunteers

These notes attempt to clarify what cover is required and from what source it may be obtained. Volunteers and those advising them or utilising their services should check the documentation purporting to provide indemnity, eg Scheme or Policy wordings, and seek their own advice as appropriate. Please note that NHSLA’s schemes only apply to England, and that different arrangements exist for NHS Trusts in other parts of the UK.

Persons volunteering direct to an NHS Trust

Such individuals are covered for Public Liability, Professional Indemnity and related risks by NHSLA under the Trust’s membership of the Liabilities to Third Parties Scheme (LTPS), provided that the relevant trust has subscribed. The vast majority of trusts in England are members. There is no age limit (either upper or lower) under the scheme for such volunteers, although particular trusts may have their own rules.

Persons volunteering with other organisations, e.g. Leagues of Friends

Since there is no direct relationship between the volunteer and the trust, these people are not covered by NHSLA. However, Attend (formerly the National Association of Hospital and Community Friends) operates an insurance scheme for its members covering relevant risks. Their website is www.attend.org.uk. Please note that organisations not affiliated to Attend do not have the benefit of this arrangement and must therefore seek alternative insurance protection.

Motor Risks

NHSLA does not cover any form of Motor risk, even for NHS-owned vehicles. Volunteers giving lifts to patients, for example, must ensure that they have adequate insurance protection of their own, either under their own personal motor insurance policy or via the policy of the organisation for which they are volunteering.

Risks

All volunteers, however, briefly or infrequently they offer their services, must have adequate Public Liability and Professional Indemnity cover. For example, a volunteer might inadvertently damage a patient’s luggage by dropping it, cause serious injury by failing to clear up properly after a spillage on the floor of a Friends’ shop, advise a patient negligently as to how to access services, or leave a box of books in a corridor, resulting in someone tripping over it and sustaining a broken leg. These are just a few of the many situations in which a volunteer could incur a liability to others.

Limits of Indemnity

NHSLA’s schemes do not have limits of indemnity. All commercial insurance policies, however, contain such restrictions. We do not seek to advise what would be an adequate limit of indemnity under commercial arrangements, but as an indication, many claims involving serious brain damage, resulting in substantial future care through a long remaining life, are now settling in the region of £3m to £5m each, and some at an even higher level.

Checking Arrangements

Trusts are strongly advised to check the adequacy of insurance arrangements for all voluntary groups using their premises. It is possible that a trust might be successfully sued in negligence by the injured party, should the relevant volunteer be uninsured, for failing to establish that the volunteer organisation to which the negligent person belongs has relevant insurance in force.