COVERAGE THAT’S BUILT FOR THE JOB
Specialized protection for skilled trades
Skilled trades professionals move between shops, vehicles, job sites, and customer properties, often relying on specialized tools and materials to keep projects on schedule. But if a client trips over your ladder or blames your work for damage to their property, your business could face claims. Navacord provides skilled trades insurance to help protect you – wherever you work.
FROM SOLO OPERATOR TO FULL CREW
Trade expertise. Tailored coverage.
Whether you run a small or large organization, your coverage should reflect how your trade business actually operates. With deep industry experience and specialized market knowledge, our brokers build a policy around your services, project requirements, and your subcontracting practices, then stand behind you if a claim arises.
Who we help
We work with independent tradespeople, subcontractors, and established contracting businesses across a range of skilled trades. Whether you work solo or manage a full crew, we build coverage around the services you provide and how you take on work.
Protection for liability claims, electrical work, specialized tools, service vehicles, and materials being transported or installed.
Coverage for tools, vehicles, and claims involving water damage, accidental property damage, or completed plumbing work.
Insurance for heating and cooling installations, specialized equipment, service vehicles and work performed at customer properties.
Protection for tools, materials and liability exposures arising during renovation, construction and finishing work.
Coverage for installation materials, specialized tools and claims involving accidental property damage or completed work.
Insurance for mobile equipment, trailers, work vehicles and liability exposures at residential or commercial properties.
Our skilled trades insurance expertise
Our advisors understand the mobile equipment, job-site, and contractual exposures that skilled trades businesses manage every day.
We help address third-party injury and property damage exposures connected to work at job sites and customer premises.
Coverage can reflect the tools and equipment you own, rent, transport, or use away from your main location.
We help protect materials, supplies and equipment while they are in transit, stored temporarily or awaiting installation.
Our advisors consider how work vehicles, trailers, drivers and equipment transportation fit into your overall insurance program.
We help you understand insurance limits, certificates and, where relevant, bonding requirements connected to clients, general contractors and project agreements.
COVERAGE FOR THE WORK YOU DO
Key insurance coverage for skilled trades
Coverage needs vary by trade, business size, and project. A specialized Navacord advisor can help you choose the right options for your operations and how they should work together.
- Commercial general liability insurance
Commercial general liability insurance
This coverage can respond if your business is held responsible for third-party bodily injury or property damage arising from your work, including covered legal defence costs and damages.
Completed operations coverage
Part of your CGL, this responds to injury or property damage claims that arise after a job is finished. For trades, this is where the largest claims come from.
Contractors errors and omissions insurance
Your CGL excludes the cost of repairing or replacing your own faulty work. Contractors E&O fills that gap, responding when a client claims your workmanship or installation was defective and must be corrected.
- Professional liability insurance
Professional liability insurance
If you provide design, engineering or consulting services, or work on a design-build basis, professional liability responds to claims that a design error caused a loss.
- Commercial auto and fleet insurance
Commercial auto and fleet insurance
Commercial auto insurance is designed for business vehicles. Depending on the policy, coverage may include liability and physical damage protection for individual work vehicles or a fleet.
- Commercial property insurance
Commercial property insurance
Commercial property insurance can protect buildings, shop contents, inventory, and other business property against insured losses such as fire, theft, vandalism, or water damage.
- Business interruption insurance
Business interruption insurance
If insured property damage temporarily stops or limits operations, this coverage can help replace lost income and pay eligible continuing or extra expenses during recovery.
Pollution liability insurance
Some trades face pollution or contamination exposures through spills, leaks, waste, or hazardous materials. Pollution liability can address covered cleanup costs and third-party claims. Most CGL policies exclude pollution, so this coverage is typically arranged as a separate contractor's pollution liability policy.
Additional protection
Tools and equipment floater
A tools floater can cover eligible repair or replacement costs if portable tools are lost, stolen, or damaged by an insured event while at your shop, in transit, or at a job site
Contractor's equipment floater
This coverage protects larger mobile equipment against insured loss or damage while it is stored at your premises, transported between locations, or used at a project site.
Installation floater
An installation floater can cover materials, supplies, machinery, or equipment intended for installation while in transit, temporarily stored, or at the job site before installation is complete.
Learn from our skilled trades insurance experts
"The claims that hurt a trade business most rarely happen while you're on site. They show up two or three years later, when a connection fails or a fitting lets go, and by then you may have changed insurers or let a policy lapse. Completed operations coverage is what responds, and it only works if there's no gap in your coverage history. Before you switch carriers or cancel a policy, ask your broker what happens to the work you've already finished."
FAQs for skilled trades
Even if you’re a small subcontractor, you need to protect yourself, your tools, and equipment to keep the business going if something unexpected happens. If your business relies on tools and equipment, you should know exactly how much it would cost to replace them, including sales tax, and ensure you have enough coverage, or you could be out of pocket if they’re damaged or stolen.
Commercial general liability (CGL) insurance is the foundation of any trade business' insurance program. It is not always a legal requirement, but nearly every client, general contractor and property owner will require proof of it before you start work. Business auto insurance and provincial workers' compensation coverage are legally required in most cases. Requirements vary by province.
Commercial general liability insurance primarily covers third-party injury and property damage claims. Tools generally require separate property or floater coverage, and protection depends on the policy’s limits, deductible, and terms.
The cost of your specific policy depends on factors such as your trade, services, annual revenue, number of employees, payroll, vehicles, equipment values, subcontracted work, claims history, limits, and deductibles.
This varies depending on your business and the type of coverage you need, as some businesses have more complex insurance needs. You may be asked about your services, business structure, employees, subcontractors, work locations, vehicles, tools, equipment, and required coverage limits.
