In the UK, a change is underway for customers who sell content covered with Basil Fry. What was previously called insurance coverage will now be called Protection, so operators will now sell customers Protection via a new product called StoreProtect rather than Insurance.

Also, the SSA is releasing Storer Check, a database designed to protect operators from renting units to people who have been added to it. To use Storer Check, you will need to add the relevant terms to your contract.

Our goal is to make these changes as simple as possible for you, so we have put together the step-by-step guide below to update your insurance sales to StoreProtect.

You can start by watching this video of Basil Fry Director, Adam Kellaway, and I going over this article to discuss the step-by-step guide:

At Stora, one of our main goals is to make things easier for our customers, self storage operators. Historically, the customer contract included dozens of fields for the operator to fill out, including move-in date, rental price and the unit number rented by the customer.

​As operators ourselves, we saw a couple of issues with a contract that required so many fields:

One of the key things about all these fields is that the information is already stored in Stora, and is accessible by the customer via their customer portal.

So, our approach to the contract was to find a way, in agreement with the insurance providers and the SSA, to develop a version that simply references the relevant information, while removing the need to fill out so many fields. The benefit of this is that the contract doesn't need to be updated during the customer stay (following a price change, or a unit move, for example) and that it can be signed much more quickly.

​The Stora version of the contract (which is provided to you by Basil Fry but amended for Stora customers) maintains all of the legal protection for operators, while simplifying the process for both operators and customers.

The first step is to speak to your contact at Basil Fry about your policy renewal, and the shift to StoreProtect. Once that has been agreed, Basil Fry will provide you with a contract that is suitable for Stora customers. If you are a member of the SSA and wish to adopt the Storer Check terms, Basil Fry will give you a version that includes them. If you are not a member of the SSA, Basil Fry will provide you with a contract that is not SSA-approved.

While you are in touch with Basil Fry, also ask them for the email content for your customer email (see step 6).

This version of the contract will require you to add details such as your company name, contact details, opening hours and other areas. Fill these in and when you are happy with it, save the document for later so you can upload it.

When selecting a go-live date for moving all new customers to StoreProtect, ensure you have agreed this date with Basil Fry (they will need to make a change to your policy from that date).

Now that your contract is ready, upload it to whatever online signing system you use and prepare it so that customers will fill in all required fields (Name, Signature, Initials, etc). Once you have this contract ready, upload the URL for it to your Stora account here.

Now, you must update your website to ensure it has the correct wording and customers are ticking the correct box to ensure they are abiding by the terms correctly. Here are the steps:

Ensure all new customers who take out Protection are now paying VAT instead. We have released a new feature which lets you create your own Tax Rates from within Stora, and apply them as required to each of your Sites. When you wish for new bookings to have VAT applied to Protection, you can make this change in a couple of minutes and all new bookings from then will be correctly set up to have VAT charged on Protection.

For full details on how to do this, please read our Guide on Creating and Setting Tax Rates.

Reminder: make sure you have let Basil Fry know the date you switch to selling StoreProtect

Your existing customers must be given at least 28 days notice of any change to their contract. In advance of the change, email your customers to inform them of the change (they do not need to sign anything). It is important to get the wording of this email correct, so make sure you are using the wording provided to you by Basil Fry.

There are various ways to email your customers from Stora. For bulk email, we would recommend exporting a list of your live subscriptions and uploading the emails to an email service like Mailchimp. Alternatively, you could email them all directly from your business email address (make sure to use Bcc). Some email systems limit the number of email addresses you can put on bcc so it may be that you will need to send multiple emails.

Existing customers' Tax Rates will not ever change when you make a global Tax Rate change as described above. Should you wish to change existing customers' subscriptions to charge VAT on Protection, you will need to individually update each subscription to apply this new Tax Rate.

You may want to consider how you change the tax rate here. Options include (1) reducing the price of your insurance so that the introduction of VAT means that the gross price (including tax) is the same and (2) keeping the non-VAT price the same, and increasing the tax, thereby increasing the overall cost to the customer.

Please read our guide on How to Update the Tax Rate of Existing Customers.

Should you wish for the Stora team to provide On-Demand Assistance to help you change existing customers VAT rates please ask via support. This service will be charged, learn more about our On-Demand Assistance fees.