Prospect is a commercial Real Estate broker in California established in 2009. Revenues are only $98,000 with about 40% coming from commercial transactions 60% coming from consulting. He has a contract with a development company which calls for carrying PL. His consulting activities and responsibili...

I have the same problem going on right now...one client is a Pest Control Co., the other is a Plumbing Contractor. No common ownership. They have a new lease with both entities listed and are sharing space. To further complicate the situation, one of office staff works for both entities. We can, of...

Rob: What catches my attention is "Yes, the insurance carrier is aware of the shared premises once I was informed. " I can only presume that the following occurred: 1. You never visited the premises a. If you had, you ignored the presence of the extra person/staff b. If you had, you did n...

I can't imagine that a preferred company would want to include a lawyer and a lobbyist on what is probably a minium premium office type policy. Even if you could find a reasonable premium situation, it does not appear the Tom Jones would contribute premiums toward a joint policy. If you have not do...

Well if they meet the definition of joint venture, sure. But just sharing an office would qualify as a joint venture? The legal dictionary defined "joint venture" as "an association of two or more individuals or companies engaged in a solitary business enterprise for profit without ac...

I'm usually fairly confident in the conclusions I reach but sometimes I just like to throw it out here to the insurance journal world and see if there is anything I'm missing or simply just to have something to point the client to to say "My peers in the industry confirm what I am saying."...

Scott, We definitely were thinking the same way. Prior to your post, we had already closed the deal. But to get there, what I said to the customer in an email is similar to what you were saying (although I candy coated it a bit and used the word "misrepresent" instead of "lie". H...

I explained the warranty on the application and the fact that I believed any underwriter would want to know about these prior losses even if they were under the previous entity. I think he just wanted confirmation in his mind that in fact this was true, that the new insurance carrier does want to kn...

There are several consequences. First, the insured could have their coverage canceled mid-term for not disclosing material facts. Second, should they have another claim, the carrier could take a reservation of rights on the claim once they find out there were prior undisclosed losses. Third, the ag...

Here is the bottom line: Customer has three claims, one of which is open. This occurred while he was a sole proprietor. Mid term he incorporated and carrier endorsed the policy. Another broker quoted him with zero losses and zero open claims (part of their eligibility questions). When I pointed that...

Ok this is funny but it isn't a joke. A prospect started a service providing "blessing" services to people. She will go around blessing houses, weddings, retirement parties etc. She will need GL to get onto the grounds of fairs (psychic fairs) etc. Sounds simple enough so far but one of he...

Additional question regarding Farmers Commercial Auto: Anyone know if the Farmers Auto policy can provide coverage for non-owned autos (liability and physical damage) that are in the insured's care/custody/control? If so, then wouldn't that along with a GL policy preclude the need for a Garage Liabi...

Upon closer examination, some of the quotes I received which have an exclusion for bacteria/virus/organic pathogens stipulate on the endorsement that it doesn't apply to products for consumption.

You can buy Food Borne illness coverage separate, and assuming they don't serve unusual foods, it's pretty cheap. Markel offers a policy, off the top of my head. I do have one quote with First Mercury and in looking at the exclusions there is not a communicable disease or virus/bacteria exclusion o...

You get my vote for "doing the right thing". If they'd forge the cert to try and fool someone else, they'd likely have no problem "stretching the truth" to collect on a claim. I don't think ANY employee would do such a thing without the knowledge or instruction from the owner. P...