Commercial · industry practice
Contractors insurance.
GCs, subs, and trades from roofing to remodeling. We write contractors who get coverage that fits the jobsite — not what an algorithm thinks you do.
What it is.
Contractors are the messiest book a carrier writes. The exposure shifts every job — different sites, different subs, different scopes — and most off-the-shelf small-business policies have exclusions that gut coverage right when you need it. Doing this well means understanding NAICS classifications, reading the GL exclusions for residential work, and knowing which carriers actually want trade business right now.
The lines in your policy.
Each one is its own knob. The carrier's default rarely fits a real life.
What a claim looks like.
Three anonymized files. Numbers are illustrative.
Mid-size electrical contractor gets a $44K audit bill — carrier had reclassified inside-wireman crew as a higher class code mid-policy. We pull job records and re-classify accurately; final audit lands at $11K. The job-record habit set up at placement is what made the dispute winnable.
Plumber installs a water heater; six weeks later, supply-side fitting fails — $84K in damage. Products + completed operations responds because we'd insisted on broader 'work performed' wording at placement. A standard small-business policy would have excluded this and the claim would have been denied.
Enclosed trailer broken into overnight at a job site. $32K in tools and a $9K portable generator. Inland marine pays out under blanket and scheduled limits in 14 days. GL would not have responded; auto would have excluded the trailer contents.
How to read a contractors policy.
The four things worth looking for on the dec page, in the order we read them.
The first page tells you who's actually covered, on what address, and under whose legal entity. A surprising number of policies have the wrong name, the wrong address, or a missing additional insured, and you don't find out until you file a claim. Cross-check it against your driver's license, your title or lease, and any contract that requires you to be insured.
Policy limits are abstract until you stack them against the assets they protect. A $300k liability limit feels generous in isolation; against a $1.2M home and a college fund, it isn't. Walk down each numbered line on your dec page and ask: if this were the cap on the worst day, would I be okay?
Page one shows you the base form. Pages four through twelve show you what the endorsements added, and, more importantly, what they took away. Water-damage exclusions, roof-payment schedules, named-storm deductibles, scheduled-valuables caps. These small numbered forms decide more claims than the headline limits do.
Carriers re-rate, re-form, and re-endorse policies at every renewal. If you keep last year's dec page, a side-by-side read takes ten minutes and tells you which limits drifted, which sublimits got cut, and which endorsements quietly disappeared. It's the single most useful habit in personal insurance.
Frequently asked questions.
I'm a one-person shop. Do I really need workers' comp?
In MO and KS, sole proprietors with no employees usually don't need WC by statute — but most GCs you sub for will require it on your COI before they let you on a job. We can write a low-payroll policy starting around $700/yr to clear the contract requirement.
Why is my premium so much higher than a buddy's in the same trade?
Three usual reasons: NAICS classification mismatch (you might be coded into a higher class than your actual work), claims history within your carrier's class loss ratios, and underwriting questions on the application about subs, residential mix, or work at heights. We re-shop and often find a better classification fit.
Do you handle bonds?
Surety bonds are a separate underwriting process from insurance. We don't write them in-house but we partner with two surety brokers who handle our contractor book. Same intake, same broker on point, slightly different paper.
How fast can you turn around a COI for a new job?
For active clients, four working hours during business days. We carry the most-common AI wordings on file and can issue against a contract excerpt without re-reading the whole agreement each time.
Want a second read on your contractors policy?
Send us your declarations page. You'll get it back marked up, in plain language, with the gaps and the over-coverage flagged, yours to keep, no obligation to switch.
or phone (913) 408-7280
We're an independent broker. We represent you, not the carrier , paid by the carrier we ultimately place with, but accountable only to the person whose name is on the policy. Read more about how we work.