If painting is your primary job or an additional business, you need insurance to protect your financial security. Painters should consider general liability insurance to safeguard their business from losses caused by claims of damage or injuries. In this blog, please find out more about general insurance liability for painters and what it covers, and the anticipated expenses to be covered.
Who Needs Painters Insurance?
The insurance for painters is in place to safeguard contractors and handypersons who paint the exterior or interior of residential or commercial residences. The policy covers various risks to your job that could result from paint spills, falls, and slips. The insurance protects you from any claims for compensation for personal injury, property damage, and lawsuits.
What Type of General Liability Insurance Will Cover Painters?
Professional painters require general liability insurance to protect against hazards like damage to the owner’s property, paint spillage, and third-party injuries. It also protects your small-scale business from the costly costs associated with legal actions for compensation.
Bodily Injury
General liability insurance shields the painting company from lawsuits resulting from accidents your company causes others, like homeowners slipping on your paint container. This insurance covers the cost of medical treatment and legal fees you get accused of owing to the accident.
Product Liability
Suppose the work you’ve conducted causes property damage or personal injury due to how it did. The damage could get pushed by your customer’s wall peeling away after the painting finishes. In that case, your company gets protected by product liability insurance provided by specific general liability plans.
Property Destruction
The nature of painting hands-on can expose you to harming the property of others. A general liability policy covers the expense of repairing or replacing damaged property during your work.
Personal and Advertising-Related Injuries
This insurance policy protects your company from claims that could cause reputational harm or damage another person’s image. These include copyright infringements, libel, the slander of false advertising, and infringing on privacy.
What Get Not Covered Under Painter General Liability Insurance?
Despite its extensive coverage, General Liability Insurance still has holes. In the end, your company might need to buy additional insurance. Here are a few examples:
- Damage or theft of equipment or assets in the transportation
- Damage or theft of your equipment or property when you work
- Repaying dissatisfied clients
- Business vehicles for business
- Personal injuries
- Over-spraying might not be covered based on specific policy guidelines.
Which Are Insurance Policy Limits?
The policy’s limit can get defined as the maximum amount an insurance company will pay the policyholder if an insured loss happens. They’re usually classified based on the type of loss insured and types of policies.
Some smaller businesses may be eligible for $1 million per incident or $2 million aggregate limits. The policy will pay up to $1 million per claim and $2 million throughout the procedure if a risk occurs.
The amount of coverage you will need get based on various factors, including the scale of your company, the number of employees, and the risk you could face. If you’re purchasing general liability insurance to fulfill the requirements of your lease or contract, make sure that the insurance meets the policy limits you’ve requested.
How Do I Receive the Certificate of Insurance?
An insurance certificate is a form of documentation that outlines the types of insurance coverage and limitations of your policy. It acts as evidence of insurance. When you purchase liability insurance, this triggers the issue of this certificate.
Some customers require this evidence of insurance before they can start working on job sites. The professional license you hold may require an insurance certificate.
Most insurance companies have insurance certificates within the initial paperwork for their customers. If you still need to be provided with this certificate, you can ask your insurance provider to send you one.
Painting Contractor’s Risks and Exposures
Painters have to deal with liability risks like property damage and bodily injuries. General liability insurance safeguards your business from financial losses in the following situations.
Injury to a Non-Employee or Third Party
General liability insurance covers you from the cost of bodily injury to third parties. For example, you can lay a tarpaulin sheet on the floor to collect paint drips and protect the floor. Unfortunately, when your client checks the progress of the painting, They step onto the slippery tarp injuring their leg.
The insurance company will cover medical costs and court-approved compensation in this case. Additionally, your insurance will pay funeral costs if serious accidents cause a person’s death.
Property Loss
Painting jobs are prone to the risk of causing damage to your property due to the paint’s oils and stains. Poor handling of colors can cause spills that can spot on furniture and floors. For instance, you can fall over a paint bucket, resulting in a massive tumble on a customer’s carpet.
Furthermore, physical tools like ladders may cause property damage that gets not intended. A ladder that isn’t stable could slide over and crash into the home entertainment system of the customer.
Your insurance company will cover any repair work or reconstruction of damaged property and pay for the costs of settling lawsuits if your client files a lawsuit.
Legal Costs
The client may try to sue your business after the painting job got finished, as agreed upon in the contract. Although the case might be malicious or based upon false claims, you might require the assistance of an attorney. A prolonged legal battle will result in high defense costs, which the general liability insurance policy will be able to cover.
Personal and Commercial Damage
Suppose you criticize a rival by claiming their products are better than yours. In that case, They can file a lawsuit for slander, alleging that your remarks hurt their reputation. Libel or slander, libel or copyright infringement, advertising injury, or invasion of privacy could trigger lawsuits.
You could create a personal injury or damage a company’s reputation by copying ads or using the name of someone else’s or an image without their permission. In addition, copyright infringement could be unintentionally caused by using a logo closely resembling another brand.
General liability insurance can protect you from such situations by covering legal expenses and court costs.
Purchase General Liability Insurance for Painters
The painting business you run is crucial for your peace of mind. General liability insurance is a way to safeguard your business from potential damages. Contact a Commercial Insurance Ottawa agent today at (613) 454-5640 and mail us at info@commercialinsuranceottawa.com.