Commercial Business Insurance

A Commercial General Liability (CGL) policy protects your business from financial loss should you be liable for property damage or personal or advertising injury caused by your services, business operations, or your employees. Understanding this coverage is an important first step in managing CGL risks.

A CGL insurance policy will usually cover the costs of your legal defense and will pay, on your behalf, all damages if you are found liable—up to the limits of your policy. CGL coverage is one of the most important insurance products, due to the negative impact that a lawsuit can have on a business and because such liability suits happen so frequently.

Commercial Property Insurance helps your clients recover when certain disasters jeopardize their business assets and real estate. Covered events might include fire, windstorms, theft, or vandalism. Your client can then use the payout from your Commercial Property policy to repair or replace items such as office buildings, computers, furniture, inventory, and equipment.

Many Commercial Insurance policies also include Business Interruption Insurance. This policy covers up to twelve months of lost income when certain events force your client to put their business operations on hold. For example, if a fire destroys your client’s workplace, Business Interruption Insurance can pay for the ongoing costs of keeping your client’s business afloat when it cannot generate revenue.

Commercial Auto Insurance is a policy of physical damage and liability coverages for amounts, situations, and usage not covered by a personal auto policy. This type of business insurance covers a variety of vehicles.

Commercial Auto Insurance, like your personal auto policy, provides similar coverages such as liability, collision, comprehensive, medical payments (or personal injury protection) and uninsured motorist coverage. However, there are also differences between a commercial auto insurance policy and your personal auto policy that may include eligibility, definitions, coverages, exclusions, and limits.

Workers’ Compensation is a type of insurance program that insures employees for illnesses and injuries that arise out of the job. The program is mandated by the state, and each state establishes different rules for when an employer must acquire such insurance.

Employees benefit from the program by receiving medical care after sustaining an injury or illness that is work-related. Injured employees receive a certain portion of their wages while they are off work for the treatment of such injury or illness, depending on state rules. States also establish their own rate of compensation when an employee loses a bodily member, is permanently disabled, or dies as a result of the work-related accident.

Workers’ Compensation is a no-fault insurance program, meaning that the injured employee does not have to go the traditional tort route of proving negligence in order to recover. In exchange, the employee generally cannot sue the employer for his or her injuries.

Commercial Umbrella Insurance provides businesses with additional liability coverage to help protect them against the potentially ruinous costs of claims. Significant assets can be at risk when businesses are the target of lawsuits. If the cost of a claim exceeds the limits of a business’s underlying primary insurance policies, Commercial Umbrella Insurance extends liability coverage for an additional layer of insurance to further protect business assets.

A Commercial Umbrella Policy increases business liability protection when the costs of a lawsuit exceed the limits of the primary underlying business liability coverage. So, a commercial umbrella insurance policy will help protect a business when accidents such as the following happen:

• A customer slips on a wet floor in your office and injures himself. The medical costs of the injuries exceed your general liability policy’s limits.
• An advertising error results in major lawsuits against your business with costs that exceed your primary business liability insurance coverage limits.

Directors and Officers Liability Insurance protects past, present, and future directors and officers of for-profit or non-profit companies from damages resulting from alleged or actual wrongful acts they may have committed in their positions. The policy provides protection in the event of any actual or alleged error, misstatement, omission, misleading statement or breach of duty. In addition, some policies extend the same coverage to employees.