Insurance Policies
Small businesses make up over half of America’s workforce. One of the primary ways for small business owners to protect their assets from damage or destruction is through commercial insurance.
Coverage of insurance is available to protect one’s small business from several things that could cause risk. To prepare for these risks in the future, here are some types of insurance that commercial insurance companies can offer you.
Commercial Property Insurance
Property insurance is made to protect companies against unexpected incidents that damage or destroy company assets and put the business at great risk. These incidents include storms, earthquakes, fires, and acts of theft or malice from possible intruders. When this happens, it is not your fault. What property insurance covers are the physical location of your business, as well as the supplies and equipment that your business owns. Commercial property insurance can either cover all forms of risk, or one specific risk at a time, for example, “fire insurance”.
Commercial Vehicle Insurance
Vehicle insurance is meant to cover automobiles that are owned by the company, such as cars, vans, and trucks, in case of an accident, theft, flood, or other unexpected event associated with using the vehicle for commercial purposes. Such purposes may include deliveries, at-home visits, and off site services. If employees are driving their own cars on their way to and from work, it is not qualified for coverage of commercial vehicle insurance.
Similar to car insurance that a person or family owns, commercial vehicle insurance can also provide financial support against a worker who suffers an injury while operating a company-owned vehicle for commercial use, in addition to coverage of collisions and motorists who are not insured.
Liability Insurance
Also going under the name Commercial General Business Liability Insurance, this means that you as an owner are not held liable for property damage or injuries that would be accidentally caused by you, your employees, your equipment, or your products. This is essential for every business, as there is always a chance for something to go wrong from inside your company each day. Liability insurance is split into three different kinds of commercial liability.
General liability protects business owners against lawsuits stemming from injuries, accidents, or negligence claims.
Product liability protects vendors and manufacturers against claims of product defects. This can also protect business owners against damage or injury caused by his or her product.
Health Insurance
Commercial health insurance from commercial insurance companies is mandatory for companies that have more than 50 full-time employees under payroll. For companies with fewer than 50 employees, there are no penalties for not providing health insurance and are not required by law. Even though it is unlikely that you are strictly required to buy health insurance for your employees, having health insurance is still a good idea, regardless of how many employees currently work for you.
There are times that you would be thankful that you have commercial health insurance. Some positive aspects to providing health insurance to your employees include higher values for employee benefits, tax credits, and of course, higher levels of confidence and morale so your employees can be more productive knowing that their potential injuries would be taken care of.
Bundled Commercial Policies
Also known as a “package policy” a bundled policy is a combination of policies that are listed above as well as other policies not mentioned. Small business owners can spare themselves time and money by choosing a policy that includes several types of protection. A common bundle is called the Business Owner’s Policies, or BOPs.