Businesses provide goods or services to the marketplace. The owners of a firm encounter several risks in pursuit of revenue and seek to maximize profitability of their organization. The Salvati Insurance Group is comprised of customer service focused producers and support professionals who do what it takes provide best in class risk management advisory for our clients. We aren’t order takers. We are humbly confident in our experience based advisory. We do the right thing and have tough, yet empathetic conversations with our clients to manage the risks of long-term sustainability.
General Liability insurance is a policy that helps preserve your business assets by covering legal costs and damages or settlements up to the limit of your policy for covered claims. Although you operate your business with care, accidents can happen. For example, a customer slips on a wet floor and gets injured. Your product malfunctions and damages a client’s property. A competitor claims that your advertisement infringes on their copyright. These are some of the accidents that can result in claims and lawsuits against your business.
Typically, general liability policies provide:
Often, general liability policies offer as an option:
Having the right commercial property coverage could mean the difference between a minor disruption to operations and a major financial loss.
Commercial property insurance is coverage that can protect your company’s physical assets from unexpected events, including fires, windstorms, theft and vandalism. Physical assets covered by commercial property coverage could include the business property you own or rent, office equipment, furniture, fixtures, inventory and other items you count on to support your daily operations.
The ownership and occupancy of a commercial property will determine the type of coverage recommended. There are different carriers who will offer coverage and different types of policies for property including, but not limited to:
Commercial umbrella insurance covers large unexpected events that can have a devastating impact on your business, brand reputation and financial stability. While standard liability policies can help protect a company from a broad range of situations, there are certain times when losses may exceed what primary insurance can fully cover. From damaging multi-million dollar lawsuits, to auto accidents, to product liability claims: protecting your company means preparing and planning for the worst case scenario.
A commercial umbrella liability policy supplements your existing policy’s general liability, auto liability and employer’s liability limits.
Workers’ compensation insurance provides medical and wage benefits to people who are injured or become ill at work. The coverage is mandated by each state and the wage and medical benefits vary by state. Workers’ compensation is considered a social insurance because it relies on a social contract between management and labor, wherein exchange for purchasing workers’ compensation insurance, business owners are protected from civil suits from their workers who become injured on the job.
All firms that have employees, contractors, or volunteers that receive remuneration must obtain worker’s compensation insurance that is paid for by the firm itself. Employee status (W2 vs 1099) does not impact the requirement for all employee remuneration to be accounted for in worker’s compensation. Sole Proprietors, Partners, or LLC Members with at least 10% ownership and their direct family can exclude themselves from the WC calculation, however some states may require a minimum payroll even for owners. In Michigan, a firm not carrying worker’s compensation insurance may be levied a fine by the Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity of up to $1,000 per day.
All states, with a small number of exceptions (Texas), require businesses with employees who are not owners, to purchased workers’ compensation coverage for those employees.
Businesses that fail to provide workers’ compensation coverage can face severe and costly repercussions including payment of claims out of pocket, fines and possible imprisonment, as well as possibly losing the right to conduct business in the state.
Every type of organization, from global companies to mom and pop shops that use technology to do business, face cyber risk. As technology becomes more complex and sophisticated, so do the threats that businesses face. This is why every business and organization needs to be prepared with both cyber liability insurance and an effective cyber security plan to manage and mitigate cyber risk.
Cyber liability insurance is an insurance policy that provides businesses with a combination of coverage options to help protect the company from data breaches and other cyber security issues. It’s not a question of if your organization will suffer a breach, but when.
Cyber liability insurance can cover costs associated with data breaches and cyber attacks on your business. Those costs can include such things as lost income due to a cyber event, costs associated with notifying customers affected by a breach, costs for recovering compromised data, costs for repairing damaged computer systems and more. Coverage options are available to address:
Group benefit plans are insurance plans that employers can purchase for their employees or offer to employees at a subsidized rate. There are a variety of group insurance options available, including but not limited to:
Errors and Omissions (E&O) insurance helps protect against the costs of allegations made by clients for inadequate work, negligent actions or failure to provide the expected level of service. As a professional operating in today’s increasingly litigious environment, you could easily be subject to allegations by unhappy clients who may feel they’ve been harmed by your actions or inactions.
For some professionals, contracts require E&O coverage if a mistake, real or perceived, is made that costs your client money or damages their reputation.
Without E&O insurance coverage, your business may be responsible for the costs of legal defense should you be sued. Those costs can include defense costs and settlement costs, as well as the time required to respond to a claim and the potential damage to your company’s brand and reputation.
Commercial auto insurance is a business insurance policy that applies to autos owned by or used in your business that protects your business against liability for damages caused by accidents involving your business autos and provides certain compensation to occupants of your business autos injured in accidents.
If your business owns vehicles, a commercial auto insurance policy can provide valuable financial protection to you and your employees while driving a company owned vehicle or a hired or personally-owned auto in your business operations. It’s important to know that a personal automobile insurance policy usually does not cover vehicles used in the operation of your business.
The commercial auto policy provides physical damage coverage for vehicles you own, lease, hire or use in your business and liability coverage for bodily injury and property damage caused to others by your use of the insured business vehicles.
It can include two types of physical damage coverage for your insured vehicles:
It also includes three types of liability coverage:
The Salvati Insurance Group has provided risk management advisory and insurance products to Cannabis clients regulated by the 2016 MMFLA and the 2018 MRTMA since the early days of legislation in Michigan. Michigan’s legal cannabis industry is now approaching $2,000,000,000 in annual sales.
Cannabis is big business and often our cannabis clients are among the most sophisticated and engaged clients. The needs of cultivators, processors, secure transport, and provisioning are unique. TSIG provides true independent cannabis insurance advisory and risk management including, but not limited to:
A surety bond is simply an agreement between three parties: Principal, Surety and Obligee.
The surety provides a financial guarantee to the obligee (i.e. government or private client) that the principal (business owner) will fulfill their obligations. Therefore, a surety bond is a risk transfer mechanism.
A principal’s “obligations” could mean complying with state laws and regulations pertaining to a specific business license, or meetings the terms of a construction contract, depending on the type of the surety bond.
If the principal fails to meet their agreed upon obligations with the obligee, the surety may be required to resolve the dispute by paying a claim to the obligee. It is in this sense that a surety bond is similar to a form of credit extended to the principal by the surety.
Type of common bonds include, but are not limited to:
Employment Practices Liability Insurance (EPLI) covers businesses against claims by workers that their legal rights as employees of the company have been violated. Employment related claims impact organizations of every size, in every industry and can disrupt businesses, hurt employee morale, damage reputations, and cost businesses financially … even before going to court.
EPLI includes coverage for defense costs and damages related to various employment-related claims for acts by employees to other employees (1st party) or for acts of employees towards non-employees (3rd party) including, but not limited to allegations of:
Businesses can obtain insurance against crimes being committed against them by employees (1st party) or non-employees (3rd party). There are seven types of insuring agreements that relate to crime insurance:
Agriculture business insurance was created to protect businesses that generate most of their earnings from agriculturally based activities. Some of these businesses include:
Business succession planning is a crucial aspect of managing a company, especially for small and closely-held businesses. It involves developing a strategy for transitioning ownership and leadership of the business to ensure its continued success in the event of retirement, disability, death, or the voluntary departure of key individuals. Buy/sell agreements and key person insurance are two important components of this planning process.
A buy/sell agreement is a legally binding contract among business owners that outlines what happens to an owner’s share of the business in the event of certain triggering events, such as death, disability, retirement, divorce, or the desire to sell the business. Here are some key elements of buy/sell agreements:
Key person insurance, also known as key man or key employee insurance, is a type of life insurance policy taken out by a business on the life of a key employee or owner. The purpose is to provide financial protection to the business in the event of the key person’s death or disability. Key person insurance helps mitigate the financial risks associated with losing a key employee or owner and can provide the company with the financial resources needed to continue operations during a transitional period.
Business succession planning, including buy/sell agreements and key person insurance, should be customized to the specific needs and circumstances of the business. We will assist you in working with the proper legal professionals to create and implement a comprehensive succession plan that safeguards the business and its stakeholders.
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