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Are You Covered?
  • Your Building in Winter
    Winter brings the threat of freezing temperatures and harsh conditions to much of the U.S. Some places are well beyond the threat; it’s going to freeze—there’s no way around it. Such conditions pose unique hazards to commercial building owners. Following is some information on common winter threats and how they are addressed by commercial property insurance.
  • D&O Insurance:  Protection from Boardroom Liability
    Many people will celebrate the holiday by giving back to their community. Volunteering time or services to a company or non-profit organization may be a selfless act of generosity, but these acts of goodwill can also expose volunteers to possible lawsuits if they are making decisions on behalf of the organizations or company. Fortunately, there is a way to mitigate the exposure to lawsuits and continue lending a hand.
  • How much building insurance is enough?
    As a small business owner, you know the importance of preserving your assets. For many business owners, the largest single asset they possess is their building. Whether you occupy the building or operate as a landlord (or both), consider key exposures in your risk-management and insurance planning.
  • Don't Get Robbed Twice!
    One of the often confusing attributes of crime insurance coverages is that the terms used in the insurance policies reflect legal definitions, not the meanings we assume in everyday conversation.
  • Insuring Income: The Lifeblood of Your Business
    If someone asks you if your firm has a catastrophe plan, how would you respond? Would your answer sound something like this: “There’s nothing in writing, however, if something happened that compromised our ability to earn we have a good idea what we would do.”
  • Business interruption insurance
    Would you believe that there is an insurance product specifically designed to help insure a solid, sustainable profit? In fact, without this coverage, hitting your profit targets may become impossible.
  • Where medical fits into liability coverage
    There are two extremely valuable provisions in a solid business insurance policy designed specifically to respond to incidents such as this. The goal of the provisions is twofold:  protect your business from the financial risk of such accidents—legal fees for defense, the potential for large lawsuit awards against you; and try to quickly respond to the pain of the victim in ways that help to avoid lawsuits in the first place.

  • Don’t Let the "Gottas" Determine Your Risk
    As the owner of a small business, you understand better than anyone the meaning of “risk.” The key is to know understand how much risk you can afford, and when or where is the right place to take risk.
  • Don’t Let Your Income Slip When You Do
    Chances are you started your small business with long days and longer nights.  You are fully aware of the truth of the old saying:  'When you are self-employed you work for the toughest boss in the world!"
  • Boom: Understanding Discontinued Operations Coverage
    As a homebuilder, you spent your life making sure the work you did was safe and sufficient. Every year you purchased a commercial general liability (CGL) policy just in case. You made it many years with no claims and want to reward your good work with a much deserved and overdue retirement in where else? Florida.
  • Protecting Your In-Home Business
    Today more than 43 million Americans are operating full- or part-time businesses from the comfort of their homes, and these numbers continue to grow every year. One of the secrets to running a successful home-based business is being able to separate your business activity from your home activity.
  • Landlords, Beware
    Experienced landlords will agree that there is nothing quite as comforting as a good tenant; especially if the tenant spends his own money making improvements to your building during the lease term. 
  • Managing Your Mod
    Employers are told by the states in which they do business how to provide adequate workers compensation insurance for employees. As in other forms of insurance, fair pricing is determined using historical loss data. In the workers comp world, this data is assigned to specific job-types; hence a roofer who hasn’t had a claim in 25 years may still pay a very high rate for his coverage.
  • Insuring the Theft of Your Business Data
    The stories of breached data security have become almost too familiar: An employee takes home a laptop against regulations. A hard drive is sent out for repair, but disappears. A disc with sensitive data is stolen from an office. For business owners and managers, the threat is real, and there is a need to protect against such violations of data security.
  • Triple Net Lease Caveats
    In recent years, more and more building owners are becoming fascinated with the concept of the “triple net lease.” A primary reason for the interest is that the terms of such a lease require the tenant of the building purchase and maintain adequate insurance on the building itself. This is in contrast with traditional lease agreements, which generally state that a tenant is responsible for insuring what’s his and the building owner handles the rest.
Boom: Understanding Discontinued Operations Coverage

As a homebuilder, you spent your life making sure the work you did was safe and sufficient. Every year you purchased a commercial general liability (CGL) policy just in case. You made it many years with no claims and want to reward your good work with a much deserved and overdue retirement in where else? Florida.

Understanding that coverage under the CGL policies you have purchased is triggered by an “occurrence,” thus solidifying coverage “forever into the future,” you decide not to renew your policy. After all, who wants to keep paying for insurance on a business they no longer work in, especially knowing that if a claim were to arise from past work you’re covered anyway?

Basking in the sun next to your cellular phone, you are surprised to receive a call from a familiar voice from your past. It’s your insurance agent, informing you that a deck you installed on a home two years ago collapsed during a party. No one was killed, but several of the 35 folks on the deck were injured. A claim is being filed against you for the injuries and damage to the home resulting from the accident. Your agent then informs you that you have no insurance to cover the claim.

How could this be? After all, you always purchased “occurrence” CGL policies, including the policy in force two years ago when you built the deck. And since “occurrence” coverage goes forever into the future, why is there no insurance coverage for this recent accident?

The concept of an “occurrence” policy is one of the most misunderstood in liability insurance. It is true that an “occurrence” policy could provide coverage for accidents that happen well after the policy has been in force. However, the agreement in the policy says that for insurance to apply the “bodily injury” (in this case to the folks rudely introduced to the ground below the deck) and/or “property damage” must occur during the policy period.

To simplify, some refer to an “occurrence” policy as “boom” coverage. Specifically, when did it go “boom?” In this case, while the negligently constructed deck was installed two years earlier, the “boom” happened when the deck actually collapsed; this was the accident that caused the bodily injury and property damage. The only liability coverage that would cover this claim would be a policy that was in place when the deck actually went “boom.”

You can leave a business behind, but liability can follow you forever. Anyone in a business that provides products or services is susceptible to this fact. To address the risk of the unknown, insurance companies have developed insurance called discontinued operations liability. This policy will continue to provide liability insurance to you even after your interest in a business ceases. Ask your Trusted Choice® insurance professional about discontinued operations liability insurance and how it will help you enjoy the future even if the past gets in the way.

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127 South Peyton Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
Phone: 800.221.7917
Fax: 703.683.7556
Email: Trusted.Choice@iiaba.net