The Importance of being Insured

The world can be a very scary place. Every day, people are faced with innumerable challenges, and sometimes they face events that are not only unavoidable, but can have tragic results. When accidents or natural disasters occur in your life, you need something in place you can trust to be in your corner and help you salvage and rebuild your life. You need a safety net that allows you to run not only your life but your day to day operations without having to worry about what will happen to you if something disastrous occurs. You need insurance policies.

There are many different types of insurance policies out there. They can cover anything from house fires to tornadoes tearing through your warehouse. Everyone should have multiple policies in place to take care of their personal needs should something happen to themselves or the things they own. Homeowners insurance takes care of the house, automobile insurance takes care of the car, and life insurance policies take care of your loved ones. Having these policies in place is smart and helps in protecting the ones you love. These personal policies are all well and good, but one must consider the consequences of not protecting their business with general business liability insurance policies.

If something were to occur within your company or business and lawsuits and liability issues result, what are you going to do if you’re not covered? Having a general liability insurance policy is a smart way to make sure that you will have the legal and financial help you need should your company suffer a tragic or costly event in the workplace. If your commercial business insurance policy is not in place when an accident or natural disaster occurs you are opening yourself up, personally, to some very expensive consequences. These consequences could overflow from your business into your personal finances and cause any number of setbacks that you may not recover from.

Insurance is designed to allow you to run your business with the knowledge that if a bad situation occurs; the consequences will be taken care of. Insurance makes it possible to rebuild, to restructure, and to retain what is yours. You don’t want to spend your life building a legacy for your family only to find that at the first sign of disaster all of your hard work goes right down the drain. You have to protect your investments and that means making sure all of your assets are covered. So when your laying out your business plan, make sure you get yourself covered, and get a commercial business or general liability insurance policy. Don’t lay the foundation for your life’s work without a safety net place.

Common Commercial Business Insurance Terms Explained

If you're planning to renew your company's business insurance or buy a new policy, it's easy to get overwhelmed. Commercial business insurance can be daunting, and the industry jargon can make it more complicated than it should be. Because making sure your business is properly insured against risk, it's your responsibility to understand these terms, although your agent or insurance company will help. Here are some terms you may run across when you're buying business insurance in Miami, FL or anywhere else.

Advertising Injury: This is damage that arises from oral or written advertisements that libel or slander another business or entity's products, services or goods.

Aggregate Limit: This is the maximum amount of coverage for a general business liability insurance policy or property damage policy. It may be figured per occurrence or for the entire policy term.

Agreed Amount Endorsement: This is an agreement by your insurance company that there will be no coinsurance penalty at the time of a claim.

Alternative Dispute Resolution: This means that rather using the court system to settle disputes, parties must use methods such as mediation and arbitration.

Annual Aggregate: The maximum amount your commercial business insurance policy will pay out during a one-year period.

Bodily Injury: This is any disease, physical injury or sickness sustained by someone, including death. You will see this term on a general business liability insurance policy that covers you if someone is hurt on your property.

Business Owners Policy (BOP): This is an insurance policy that combines business general liability insurance, property insurance and business interruption coverage.

Catastrophe: This describes an act of nature causing severe damage, including tornadoes, earthquakes and floods.

Commercial General Liability Insurance (CGL): This is business general liability insurance that covers liability such as product liability, or liability exposure from your premises, operations or contractors.

Deductible: This is the portion of your claim that you must pay for. Larger deductibles will result in lower insurance premiums.

Named Peril: A specific event or occurrence covered by your insurance policy.

Negligence: The failure to use reasonable care.

No-Fault: This is an insurance procedure in which the policyholder's insurance pays for injuries regardless of who caused the accident.

Personal and Advertising Injury: This is an injury that results from false arrest or detention, oral or written publications, or the use of someone else's ideas.

Product Liability: This is a decision of who may sue whom for any damages or injuries that occur as a result of a defective product.

Replacement Cost: This is the cost or replacement of damaged property without deducting depreciation, or the decrease in insurable value due to wear-and-tear.

Total Loss: This is a loss so great that there is no value remaining and the property is completely destroyed. It can also mean a loss so large it requires the maximum payout of your commercial business insurance policy.