How To Protect Your Business With A Solid Email Policy

You may have the title and the corner office. However, if you have yet to consider or deal with all of your legal risks, you run the risk of putting your entire company in jeopardy over a single unexpected accident.

These days, companies often run into trouble when it comes to email. For many fields, it’s the preferred mode of communication over phone or face-to-face conversations. Your employees are communicating with clients, vendors, and other employees all day, every day.

Are you sure you know what they are saying? More importantly, what are they not saying?

It’s a good idea to review with all your employees the proper way to communicate with your clients and vendors, as well as amongst themselves. Your company is responsible for their actions, and more times than not, an email with a joke, meme, or inappropriate attachment might not be taken the same for everyone.

There is a type of business insurance to cover such issues when they arise, but something as simple as setting a company email and communication policy can be an effective deterrent against any of the liability issues that might arise.

Insuring Against Misinterpreted Communications

Are you aware of every email that comes from your servers? Can you keep track of everything that every employee says during every minute of every workday?

Of course you cannot do this. However, the law looks at you like you can and places an undue burden on you as the business owner that truthfully cannot be upheld without the proper insurance.

A good insurance partner has the ability to insure your company the right way, adding to it the weight that comes with insurance protection. The first step to communications control is this email policy. However, it means nothing without a proper financial backing. If the policy is in compliance with federal and local regulations and protects your company on paper, your insurance company can make sure that it protects your company in court as well.

Some of the Best Ways to Protect Your Company in Your Company Policy

One of the first protections that you can incorporate immediately is placing a disclaimer in the signature of your outgoing email. Make sure that all employees implement this disclaimer footer in every email as well. This is actually done automatically in many of the best email aggregation programs.

Make a formal company draft of the format that you prefer for the correspondence between company employees and customers or company employees and suppliers. Create a separate template for each type of communication. Make sure that employees have an email format for the correspondence between themselves in the office as well.

Setting Company Tone for Email Professionalism

Not everyone has the same sense of humor. This is especially true if you are doing international business. You must keep company emails as straight-laced as possible in order to protect your company from a joke that gets misinterpreted or a bad translation from correspondence.

International business increases the need for protection. Cultural differences across the world means that many words, phrases, and pictures that are completely acceptable in one society are highly offensive in another society.

Your employees must accept the tone of your company as well as the template for the format of the emails. Keep everything completely professional.

You may also opt to not allow employees access to personal emails on company computers, even on break. You may be held legally liable if a personal correspondence creates confusion because it came from your business network, and all it takes is one misplaced “send” for a funny joke to become a company nightmare.

The better your company email policy, the lower your insurance rate is. Take the time to craft an insurance policy that protects your company legally along with the right insurance. Feel free to contact us when you are ready to insure your company against many of the liabilities that you may face and stabilize your business for years to come. We offer specialized insurance packages that helps your company to navigate the potential legal issues that might otherwise bring your growth to a grinding halt.