The claim you are exposed to is the one your policy excludes by name.
Commercial insurance for pesticide and herbicide applicators — written with the pollution coverage that a standard general liability policy removes.
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 pesticide and herbicide application businesses actually need.
Contractors pollution liability
Bodily injury, property damage and clean-up caused by a pollutant your work released — chemical drift, run-off, fuel spills. The standard general liability form excludes all of it.
Without it — Drift, overspray and run-off are the losses this trade actually produces, and the pollution exclusion on a standard policy was written to remove exactly them.
General liability
Third-party bodily injury and property damage — the line nearly every contract names by default.
Without it — Ordinary premises and operations claims still happen, and the certificate is still what a commercial client asks for first.
Professional liability
Covers the advice, the drawing, the diagnosis — the work itself, rather than someone getting hurt on your premises.
Without it — Treating the wrong property, the wrong species or at the wrong rate damages the thing you were paid to protect, which is a professional claim rather than an accident.
Commercial auto
Vehicles the business owns and the people who drive them for work.
Without it — Spray rigs and tanks on the road are business use and carry the chemical with them.
Workers compensation
Required in almost every state the moment you have employees. Priced on payroll and class code, which is why the class code is worth arguing about.
Without it — Chemical exposure claims can surface long after the application that caused them.
Inland marine & equipment
Tools, equipment and property in transit. It picks up exactly where commercial property stops, which is the moment the item leaves the building.
Without it — Tanks, pumps and application equipment are mobile and excluded by property coverage away from the yard.
Joe Gorman
Co-Founder | President of Commercial Lines
Came up in construction, on site and in the office, then moved into sales. Went out on a limb to become Boring’s first dedicated producer when the agency had no producers at all — and now leads the producer team. Landscaping is the class he writes most: grounds maintenance, tree work, irrigation and the spray operations that push an account out of preferred appetite.
The Grounds Guys — Franchise owners are referred to us by their corporate office. We are not affiliated with, or endorsed by, The Grounds Guys.
Five endorsements, and a certificate is none of them.
A certificate is evidence a policy existed the day it was printed — it says so on its own face. The coverage a contract is really asking for lives on the policy as named endorsements, and this is the list they come from.
- Additional insured — ongoing operationsCG 20 10Covers the general contractor for claims arising from your work while the job is in progress.Without it: They fund their own defence on a claim your work caused, then look to you for it.
- Additional insured — completed operationsCG 20 37Extends that cover to claims arising after your work is finished.Without it: The claim arrives years later, when the policy that should have carried it has renewed several times. Cheaper policies often exclude this or do not offer it.
- Primary and non-contributoryCG 20 01Puts your policy first and stops your insurer demanding a contribution from theirs.Without it: Two insurers argue about who pays while the defence waits.
- Waiver of subrogationCG 24 04Stops your insurer recovering from the party you agreed in writing to protect.Without it: Your insurer pays, then sues your customer, which ends the relationship.
- Per-project aggregateCG 25 03Gives each job its own general aggregate instead of sharing one across the year.Without it: Another project’s claims quietly spend the limit that was meant to cover this one.
Tract, condominium and apartment work is the exception that undoes all five — an exclusion for multi-unit residential removes the coverage before any endorsement can apply. What national homebuilders require covers that in full.
“They stay on top of our rates and premiums. They notify us of any potential increase and automatically shop all options to ensure we get the best possible rates. When we initially switched to them they literally cut our premiums in half for both of our companies…”
What pesticide and herbicide application operators ask us.
Does general liability cover herbicide drift?
No, and this is worth being blunt about. The standard general liability form carries a pollution exclusion, and carriers that will write chemical applicators commonly attach a total pollution exclusion as well, which is broader. Drift, overspray, run-off and contamination are the precise events those endorsements exist to remove. Coverage comes from a pollution buy-back on the general liability or a separate contractors pollution policy — not from the base form.
My state requires proof of insurance for my applicator licence. What do you file?
Most states that licence commercial applicators require evidence of financial responsibility, and several specify limits and a form of certificate that names the state agency. The requirement, the limit and the agency all differ by state. Tell us which licence you hold and we will match the certificate to what that agency will actually accept, rather than sending a generic one and finding out at renewal.
Are neighbouring-property claims common?
They are the characteristic claim of the class. Wind moves product further than operators expect, and the damaged party is usually somebody who never hired you — a neighbour’s ornamentals, a vegetable garden, a pond, or a specialty crop where the damages get large quickly. Negligence claims for failing to apply with reasonable care are the usual legal theory.
Do I need this if spraying is a small part of what I do?
The exclusion does not scale with volume. It applies to every application you make, whether spraying is all of your revenue or five per cent of it. What volume changes is the price and how easily the risk places, not whether the gap exists.