Self Employment Sickness Cover

A question about : Self Employment Sickness Cover

Hi,

I am enquiring on behalf of my Dad who has recently become self employed. He has asked me to enquire is there any insurancw cover options or any support availible for sickness cover/sick pay. Obviously he is aware sick pay isn't as easy as an employer taking care of it he just wants to know what options are availible should he ever be off work due to illness.

Thanks

Best answers:

• If he pays class 2 and class 4 contributions he should be able to claim or at least you used to be able to, things change so Im happy to be corrected.
• I meant ESA really and not SSP.
  SSP is paid by employers, is it not.
• Not sure how much things have changed in the last 3 years, but I was looking at s/e myself and talked to someone at the DWP who informed me that if I paid the Class 2 NI contribs, same as a PAYE person would, I would be entitled to the same benefits as someone on PAYE.
  I passed this info onto a mate who was just about to start s/e and when I met him again 8 months later, he was glad he had taken my advice as he had had 3 periods without work and was able to claim contrib - based JSA for those periods.