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Business transactions frequently require the valuable protection provided by insurance. A Certificate of Insurance is a document that is often requested as proof that adequate insurance exists. A certificate is not the same as a policy and certificates do not affect the coverage provided by a particular insurance policy. Therefore, requests to "endorse the certificate of insurance" are inappropriate and misleading. A certificate is a separate document that is used to comply with a common contract requirement to verify certain types and amounts of insurance.

What one has, another one wants. Usually we find legitimate means to get what we desire. However, there are the few among us who go the route of merely taking from others, especially from businesses. Crime is one of the many, serious exposures to loss where insurance protection is needed. Since other forms of coverage, such as property and inland marine policies, offer such limited protection against crime-related losses, crime insurance is necessary.

Do you operate a business from your home? If so, it’s likely that you have arranged for the proper coverage to protect your property, such as business equipment and furnishings that you use with that business. You, hopefully, have also taken care of your premises liability. In other words, this is protection for injury to business visitors or property damage that is directly related to your in-home operations. However, what about losses caused by vehicles? Are any cars, vans, trucks, etc., used in your business? If so, do you have the right protection?

A business that deals with over-the-road transportation is highly concerned with substantially minimizing accidents. Vehicle accidents, besides interrupting work and creating loss of business property, have much wider consequences. Accidents also cause serious damage to public and private property and, more significantly, also create injuries and even fatalities. Therefore, it is important that persons who drive business vehicles do so safely.

You might think that a policy that is designed to protect autos and trucks that are used by a business would cover any type of vehicle. That is a dangerous assumption, at least with regards to providing complete protection. There are instances when coverage for damage to certain types of vehicles and the legal responsibility for their use may have to be covered by two different policies. Mobile equipment falls into that nether region of insurance coverage.

Policies written for commercial operations that include a vehicle exposure (Business Auto, Garage, Trucker, and Motor Carrier Coverage) are missing an important coverage: Auto Medical Payments. This coverage handles the reasonable expenses of necessary medical and funeral services suffered by persons (other than those listed as insureds) in an eligible loss. The coverage includes expenses from related sickness, disease and/or resulting death.

Vehicles that are owned or supplied by a business, non-owned and rented cars represent a problem when they are insured under a basic business auto policy. Such policies either provide little or no coverage when a loss involves personal use or use by a person who is NOT the vehicle’s owner. Serious coverage gaps may exist, such as:

Trucking operations face unique transportation risks presented by instances of bobtailing and deadheading. A tractor that is traveling on the road without a trailer is considered to be bobtailing.

Example: Joe drops his trailer at Fran’s bakery and then heads to Doug’s Plumbing supplies to pick up a trailer. In between the two customers, he is bobtailing.

Any time a tractor is pulling an empty trailer, it is considered deadheading.

A major activity of commercial trucking is transporting cargo. There are two parties with a huge interest in the cargo: the property's owner and the trucking company or independent trucker transporting that property. Usually it is the trucker's responsibility to arrange for insurance since that is the party having custody and control of both the vehicle and the goods being shipped. Motor Truck Cargo coverage responds to a substantial, combined exposure. Specifically, it protects against the liability similar to taking a house full of expensive contents on the road for a long trip.

Business should pay close attention to their chance of suffering loss involving their use of vehicles. It's relatively easy to recognize loss created by cars and trucks that are owned and/or used in a business, such as sales representative cars or delivery vans. But there's another source of vehicular loss that is faced by many businesses: vehicles that are damaged after left in the custody of a business.