You are responsible for every trade on your site, insured or not.
Cover for general contractors and construction managers — the subcontractor exposure that decides your audit, the completed operations that outlive the job, and the certificates the owner will not release payment without.
Tell us the situation.
A licensed human replies the same business day — not an auto-responder, and not five producers calling at once. We shop it across our carriers and tell you if the policy you already have is the right one.
We use this to quote and service your insurance, and we do not sell it or pass it to lead networks. Privacy policy.
What general contractor businesses actually need.
General liability
Injury and property damage arising from the project, including your subs’ work.
Without it — You are named on every claim from the site whoever caused it.
Completed operations
Work that fails after handover, for years afterwards.
Without it — Construction defect claims arrive long after the job closed.
Builders risk
The structure under construction, materials on site and in transit.
Without it — Nothing insures a half-built building except this.
Per-project aggregate
A separate aggregate limit for each job rather than one shared pot.
Without it — One bad project can exhaust the limit protecting all the others.
Subcontractor risk transfer
The certificates, additional insured status and waivers your subs must carry.
Without it — An uninsured sub becomes your payroll at audit and your claim in court.
Umbrella
Excess limits, which owners and lenders specify by name.
Without it — Most construction contracts require more than a primary limit.
What general contractor operators ask us.
Why do uninsured subcontractors cost me money twice?
Because they hit you at audit and again in court. At audit, payments to a subcontractor who cannot produce a certificate are commonly added to YOUR payroll and charged general liability and workers comp premium as though they were your employees — a bill that arrives after the job is closed and the money spent. In court, a worker injured by an uninsured sub sues up the chain to the party with cover, which is you. Collecting certificates is not paperwork; it is the single highest-return administrative task on a construction site.
What is a per-project aggregate and do I need one?
By default your general aggregate is one annual pot shared across every job you run. A per-project aggregate — ISO form CG 25 03 — gives each project its own, so claims on one site cannot exhaust the limit protecting the others for the rest of the year. Owners and general contractors above you routinely require it, and it is one of the few endorsements that genuinely buys more cover rather than rearranging it.
What do owners typically require from us?
A general liability limit with a per-project aggregate, the owner and often the lender as additional insureds on both ongoing and completed operations, primary and non-contributory wording, a waiver of subrogation, an umbrella at a stated limit, and workers comp. Contracts also increasingly specify how long completed operations status must run after substantial completion. Send us the contract rather than a summary — the exact wording is what gets a certificate rejected and payment held.
Does our policy cover defective work itself?
Generally not the defective work; often the damage it causes. If a subcontractor installs a roof badly, replacing the roof is usually excluded as your own faulty workmanship — a business cost rather than an insured loss — while the water damage to the finished interior below is typically covered. That distinction drives most construction defect coverage disputes, and it is why the quality of your subcontractor agreements and inspections matters as much as the policy.
How is our premium calculated?
On revenue and payroll, which makes it an audited policy, and on the mix of work. Residential rates above commercial in most markets, anything structural above finish work, and height, roofing and excavation all carry their own loading. Tract housing and multi-unit residential are separately underwritten and frequently excluded — if you do any, say so, because a policy written for commercial work with a tract exclusion will not answer that claim.
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.