Who we place with, and what we actually write with each of them.
The carriers we use most, what each one is genuinely good at, and where we would not send you, written by the people submitting the accounts rather than by the carriers.
Tell us the situation.
One licensed human replies the same business day — not five agents, not an auto-responder. If the policy you have is already the right one, we will tell you.
We use this to quote and service your insurance, and we do not sell it or pass it to lead networks. Privacy policy.
Send us what you have. We’ll tell you if it’s right.
Your current policy paperwork, a renewal notice, or nothing at all. A licensed agent reads it and replies the same business day.
The carriers we reach for, and what for.
The Hartford
Technology and managed services, real technology E&O at real limits, and employment practices in the hard states.
Without it — Our number one relationship, and a book written almost entirely through agents rather than direct.
Travelers
Contractor packages, workers compensation and middle market accounts.
Without it — One of our largest carriers by new business premium, and the one whose billing takes the most explaining.
NEXT Insurance
Small contractors, fast, with certificates a general contractor will accept.
Without it — Strong and quick on the small trades, and the form has exclusions worth reading before you rely on it.
Hiscox
Professional liability and small professional services accounts.
Without it — The easiest submission of any carrier we use, and not the cheapest answer on every line.
biBerk
Workers compensation on classes other carriers decline, home health among them.
Without it — Competitive where hard-to-place workers compensation usually goes to a state fund.
Progressive Commercial
Commercial auto with no prior history, claims on the record, new authorities, and non-emergency medical transport.
Without it — The right answer when nobody else will quote you, and rarely the right answer once they will.
What we think of each of them, in full.
Written by the people submitting the accounts. Each one says where the carrier is strong, where it is not, and who we would and would not send to it, including the four that are not insurance companies at all, but programs writing on somebody else’s paper.
- The Hartford
The Hartford is our number one carrier relationship and the strongest technology and MSP program we place. They write almost entirely through agents rather than direct.
- Travelers
We place a large volume with Travelers. Their pricing is genuinely hard to beat on the right account, the service friction is real, and this is where a broker earns the difference.
- Coterie Insurance
Coterie quotes small business owners policies and general liability faster than anyone we use. The paper is not its own, and the appetite has a hard edge you want to know about before you apply.
- Beazley
Beazley is a specialist carrier we reach through BizInsure. They are strongest by a distance on home health and allied health, and the first market we go to for an agency writing its first policy.
- Hiscox
We place Hiscox. Here is where they work, where they get expensive, and the specific sublimits we would not put a technology or home health account into.
- biBerk
biBerk quotes genuinely excellent workers compensation rates on hard-to-place classes. Weigh that against the service friction and liability forms that will not satisfy a serious general contractor.
- GEICO Commercial
GEICO Commercial writes competitive commercial auto for small fleets and owner-operators, with a Berkshire Hathaway balance sheet behind it. The service model is built for volume rather than for complication.
- Chubb
Chubb writes a broad, well-written form that costs more than the cheap answer. We place them, and this is the kind of account where paying for it is the right decision.
- AmTrust Financial
We place AmTrust workers compensation regularly. Here is where the pricing is genuinely competitive, what the audit is like, and the classes we would take elsewhere.
- Progressive Commercial
Progressive Commercial is the right answer for some businesses with vehicles and the wrong one for others. Here is which, and what our clients tell us about being cancelled mid-term.
- Pie Insurance
Every policy we hold with Pie is workers compensation, and their pricing on small payrolls is genuinely competitive. There is nothing else there when the account needs a second line.
- Nationwide
Nationwide is a broad commercial writer, and their surety is the part we reach for most. That tells you where they are strongest.
- Liberty Mutual
Liberty Mutual is a large standard carrier and a modest part of our book. These are the account types where they are the answer.
- Berkshire Hathaway Homestate
Berkshire Hathaway Homestate writes commercial auto and workers compensation from one of the strongest balance sheets in the industry. The underwriting asks real questions and the pricing reflects the answers.
- NEXT Insurance
NEXT Insurance includes genuinely strong endorsements as standard and is effortless to buy from. These are the specific exclusions we see catch contractors out.
- CoverWhale
CoverWhale prices commercial auto around driver monitoring. For a carrier who cannot get quoted elsewhere it is a genuine route to cover, and a commitment worth understanding before you sign.
- Simply Business
Simply Business quotes you from a panel of carriers and adds a fee for doing it. We would rather you dealt directly with whoever is going to write the policy.
- Thimble
Thimble sells on-demand liability that is genuinely quick to buy. We have found the forms do not stand up to a serious contract, and the service is hard to reach when something goes wrong.
- CNA
CNA is one of the largest commercial carriers in the country and strongest in the professional and healthcare classes. We can write them and never have, because on the accounts we see another carrier has always been the better answer.
- Mesa Underwriters
What Mesa Underwriters Specialty Insurance Company is, why your policy is on it rather than on an admitted carrier, and what surplus lines changes for you, from an agency with 38 policies on this paper.
- CM&F Group
CM&F Group is a long-standing healthcare professional liability program written on Medical Protective paper. Here is what that means for the nurses, home health agencies and allied health practices we place there.
- Zurich
We place Zurich’s entertainment business. Their value to us is a specific appetite for film, video production and special events rather than a broad small-business book.
- Lucky Truck
Lucky Truck is a digital agency for motor carriers, not an insurance company. That changes how your filings and certificates get handled, and it is worth asking the same questions of any online trucking platform.
- Canal Insurance
Canal Insurance writes trucking and almost nothing else, on admitted paper, in thirty-plus states, with a structured new-venture program whose first tier requires the owner to be the primary driver.
- Lancer Insurance
Lancer is one of the strongest passenger transportation markets in the country — charter, school and transit buses nationally — alongside a regional trucking and contractor book that runs only in Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania.
- Nirvana
Nirvana prices trucking off your telematics data, which rewards a genuinely safe fleet, but the connection is required to quote AND to bind, they will not take new authority, and the premium finance company is theirs by rule.
- National Indemnity
National Indemnity, NICO, is a Berkshire Hathaway company that writes new ventures in all classes, public auto and accounts other markets have declined. It is frequently the answer when there is no other answer, and rarely the cheapest.
- Northland
Northland writes trucking on admitted paper across roughly forty states, packages liability with physical damage and cargo, and will not consider an operator with under two years of their own authority.
- Spinnaker
Spinnaker is fronting paper, the licensed insurer standing behind programs sold under other brands, which is why the name turns up on a declarations page nobody recognizes. In trucking we reach it through Dual North America, for distressed risks specifically.
- Accredited Specialty
Accredited Specialty is fronting paper behind program business, including trucking placed through Cover Whale, which is why it appears on declarations pages belonging to people who have never heard of it.
- Occidental Fire & Casualty
Occidental Fire & Casualty and Wilshire Insurance are the writing companies of IAT Specialty, an admitted trucking market across twenty-six states that wants three years in business and does not write hot shot.
- Great West Casualty
Great West Casualty has written nothing but trucking since 1956, carries an A+ from AM Best and insures more than 60,000 trucking companies in 46 states. In our experience the underwriting is among the strictest in the class, and loss runs arrive by postal mail, which changes when you should ask for them.
What people ask us about carriers.
Why does it matter which carrier writes my policy?
Because two policies with the same limits are not the same policy. Carriers write different forms: one excludes subcontracted work, another includes the blanket additional insured your contract requires, a third writes your class at all when most will not, and those differences decide whether a claim pays. Appetite moves as well, so a carrier that wanted your class last year can be closed to it this year, which is most of what an agent is doing when they say they will shop it. The price is what you compare first; the form is what you live with.
Are these reviews independent if you earn commission from them?
We earn commission on every carrier here, so read them knowing that. What we have tried to do is make each page worth reading anyway: every assessment is first-hand, from submitting and servicing these accounts, and every page says where the carrier is weak as well as where it is strong. Two of them are carriers we would talk most clients out of for most risks. If a page only praised, it would not be worth your time, and you would know.
How much do you actually write with each of these?
Enough to have an opinion, and the split is not what most people guess. Travelers and The Hartford are our two largest by policy count and close to level with each other; Hiscox and biBerk are the next tier and both concentrated: Hiscox in small professional and care services, biBerk in workers compensation for classes other carriers price defensively. Progressive is smaller than its name recognition suggests. We do not publish premium or account counts, but each page names the classes we place there, because that is what tells you whether the appetite is real.
Do you place with carriers not on this list?
Yes, and far more of them. It is the list we use most, not the list we have. Access runs through direct appointments, a large network, and wholesale brokers for the accounts that need the excess and surplus market, so a hard-to-place risk usually ends up somewhere that is not on this page. The useful question is not whether we have a particular carrier, but whether the risk gets in front of an underwriter who writes it.
Why go through a broker instead of buying direct?
Because it does not cost you anything, which is the part that surprises people. Broker compensation is built into the carrier's rate whether you use one or not: buying direct does not remove the cost, it removes the person being paid to be on your side of it.
Commercial insurance is 96% of what we do — it is not a department here, it is the whole business. Not ready to talk? The guides answer the questions this page raises in more depth. Already insured with us and need a certificate or a policy change? Ask the service team rather than starting a quote — it is faster and it goes to the people whose job it is. We also write home and auto, which is usually cheaper alongside the business policy than apart from it.
Handed a lease, a vendor packet or a client contract with insurance requirements? Paste it into the COI Requirements Decoder to see what each one means for your business, or read what the requirements mean.