You open your insurance drawer and see the large binders of policies stored in there. You know what you have in a general sense for your property, fleet, benefits, liabilities coverage etc... but have you ever considered how theses policies work together, or not?
Proper integration between insurance policies, and how they respond to claims, is seldom talked about or analyzed. What makes matters worse is that business owners use different brokers for various insurance lines who tend to work in silos. Owners lack a “quarterback” to bring all the different policies to the table and make sure they work together for the risks of the business enterprise. One example of this is the lack of integration between health policies and work comp policies. Many owners exclude themselves from work comp coverage to save premium. However, they are unaware that the company health policy may exclude medical expenses for on the job injuries. This comes as a huge unpleasant surprise and can be financially catastrophic to the business. Another example is employee use of personal autos on company time. Some fleet policies exclude coverage for this use and employees could be exposed when being directed by their employer to use their personal auto.
These are just a few scenarios of the lack of integration between insurance policies. There are many more. Take the time to look into this business risk with your insurance professional. The complexity of insurance policies is not going away and the risk of poor integration across lines of coverage is not either. Until next time be careful out there and know your risks.
Posted by: G. Kevin Nemith President Agency Leader CNC Insurance & Pfister Insurance , Dover DE
knemith@hilbgroup.com
Hilb Mid-Atlantic
Top 20 Insurance Brokers & Risk Managers in the USA
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