With the hustle and bustle of everyday life, there are many people out there who simply don’t have time to clean their homes and that’s where you come in as a cleaning business owner. You do your best to make sure your clients are happy with the cleaning job and will continue to use your services time and time again. When running a business, there are a lot of moving pieces in play and it can be difficult to manage every single aspect of your business. Unfortunately, there will always be things out of your control.
Accidents could cause serious damage to your business and your relationship with your clients. Some small businesses can face a legal battle during its operation and it can be financially detrimental to move past. While most people understand that cleaning business insurance is an important asset to their risk management strategy, many people don’t understand what a policy entails and how essential coverage can be.
Let’s start with the terms that will be found on your cleaning business insurance policy.
A Breakdown of Common Insurance Terms
When you look into a cleaning business insurance policy, you are bound to come across terms like liability, claims, and limits. In order to make an informed decision, it’s important to understand insurance jargon before signing up for a policy. We broke down common insurance terms that are usually found in a policy and defined them below.
Let’s get started.
Liability: When you are liable for something, it means you are held responsible for the incident. For example, you’re cleaning windows and your equipment accidentally damages it due to your negligence. The client may hold you responsible for the accident and take you to court.
Claims: A claim is a request made by the insured to the insurance company (your cleaning business insurance is with) to pay for a covered loss. In the previous example about window cleaning, filing a claim is what you would do after you have gone through the legal battle and you may be reimbursed for the expenses incurred (depending on the covered claim).
Insured: That’s you! An insured is someone who buys and is covered by a cleaning business insurance policy.
Insurer: That’s the insurance company.
Limits: This is the maximum amount of money that an insurance company may pay in a policy year. There are two limits on your cleaning business insurance policy from Canopy:
- Each Occurrence Limit
- This is the maximum amount an insurance company will pay per incident (i.e., lawsuit). Our occurrence limit is $1 million.
- Aggregate Limit
- Maximum amount an insurance company will pay out during the length of your policy. Our cleaning business insurance aggregate limit is $2 million.
No Shared Aggregate Limit
When you’re searching for cleaning business insurance for your company, your search may lead you to businesses that offer group insurance meaning that you share the amount of insurance coverage limits with other policyholders.
Let’s say you sign up for group insurance and share an aggregate limit of $5 million with other policyholders. Within the coverage year, a handful of policyholders used up the limit for their own claims and there’s no money left over for you. The downside about shared aggregate limits is that it won’t respond to claims after the limit is paid out. Your business could experience a great year and a third-party could sue you towards the end of the year. If your group policy limit is used up, you’re out of luck and have to pay for legal expenses on your own.
At Insurance Canopy, we understand that businesses face unique needs and include a $2 million dollar aggregate limit for each cleaning business insurance policyholder. We hope that you never have to face a third-party claim, but you will have peace of mind knowing that insurance coverage is there for those unexpected accidents.
Medical Expense Coverage
Many business owners purchase cleaning business insurance for the general liability coverage in case they face a legal bind. One thing to keep in mind is if your client experiences an injury, medical expense coverage could respond to the situation and may keep you out of a lawsuit.
For example, a client could trip over a vacuum cord and break their ankle. While you can’t turn back time and keep the accident from happening, you could offer to pay for the client’s medical expenses with the help of medical expense insurance included in the policy.
We offer a medical expense coverage limit of $5,000.
Instant Coverage
Unlike other insurance companies who will have you wait around for a cleaning business insurance quote, we pride ourselves on being able to provide instant coverage after purchase. We understand that business owners face risks on the job every day and don’t believe that it should take days to get you covered.
Who has time for that anyway? You’ve got work to do!
Simply complete our online application with your cleaning business info, add/decline additional coverage options, and we will calculate your cleaning business insurance cost. Once your application is complete, you have access to a digital insurance certificate and can get to work on making your client’s homes totally spotless.
The Wrap Up
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment of janitors and building cleaners is projected to grow 7 percent from 2018 to 2028 ( they also reported that type of employment is projected to experience faster growth compared to others) By 2028, 2.5 million people will be working in the cleaning business industry and it may surely increase in the future. With a little over 2 million people working in the cleaning business industry, gaining clients and trying to stand out from the rest can be difficult. While cleaning business insurance and bonding is designed to safeguard your livelihood, you can also use coverage to as a way to market to potential clients online and help add to your professionalism. At Insurance Canopy, you have access to our online insurance badge and can feature it on your site for clients to see.
We hope this article gave you a deeper understanding of cleaning business insurance and that our explanation will help you choose the right coverage for your business.
