Artisan Insurance for Contractors & Business: Quotes From $5

When most people hear the word artisan, they think about artists. The first artisans that come to most people’s minds are painters, sculptors, custom cabinet makers, toy makers, or even artisan chefs and bakers. Although many of these fields qualify as artisan businesses, there is actually a very wide range of different businesses that qualify as artisans (which we’ll discuss below). 

As an artisan, you may need a business insurance policy that reflects the specialized nature of the services you provide. Since artisan services tend to be more specialized, they often incur slightly higher risks and may require a higher degree of coverage. 

In this article, we’re going to take an in-depth look at artisans’ insurance. First, we’ll define what type of businesses can be categorized as artisans, and explain what an artisan insurance policy is and how it works. Then, we’ll show you a few of the most common categories of artisan insurance and give you some numbers on what you can expect to pay for artisan insurance, depending on the services that you and your small business provide. 

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• Painting Business Insurance & Painters Liability Insurance Quotes From $5
  

What is an Artisan Insurance Policy? 

The legal definition of an artisan is actually quite broad. That being said, let’s take a second to define it. 

By definition, an artisan is an individual or business that provides a service designed to improve the performance of a certain aspect. This means that artisan services are designed to go above and beyond what is provided by a normal technician or similar service. 

For example, a maintenance technician who performs small repairs around residential houses would be fine with a standard handyman insurance policy . However, if you provide custom cabinetry, build fancy bathrooms, kitchens, or provide another specialty service, then you would likely need to purchase an artisan insurance policy. 

In this example, the expert finish carpenter would be applying many of the same skills and using similar tools as the handyman. However, the artisan likely charges a lot more for their services and would be using more expensive, higher-quality materials. As such, the financial risk is greater for the carpenter than it is for the basic handyman making quick fixes.

Artisan Liability Insurance

Almost all artisan insurance policies are centered around a general liability or professional liability insurance policy. However, liability insurance products aren’t limited to these two. There are liability policies that artisans can add for more protection. Examples are employer’s liability insurance, cyber liability insurance, employment practices liability insurance, and more. 

Do All Artisans Need Artisan Insurance? 

If you’re a licensed artisan who is providing a service to other individuals or businesses, then you should have an artisan insurance policy. These days, there’s no telling who will sue you and what they’ll try to sue you for. If and when that day comes, your insurance policy can stand to save you tens of thousands of dollars (and even more) in potential legal fees and reparations. 

Now, you may be asking, “ What if I just make candles or other handmade crafts? Do I still need artisan insurance? ” The answer is yes  - even as a candle maker or crafter , you’ll still need to purchase handmade artisan insurance designed for your candle-making or soap-making business .

To keep it short and simple - if you’re selling artisan products or providing artisan services, then you need artisan insurance. Even if you don’t purchase coverage for yourself (which you should), having an insurance policy will give clients a greater degree of confidence in your services, which will allow you to charge more and acquire more clients. 

Now, let’s take a few minutes to go over some of the more common categories of artisan insurance that you may come across while shopping.

Marine Artisan Insurance

Marine artisan insurance is a type of liability policy designed to cover marine artisans who repair or improve boats and other watercraft. For the most part, artisan insurance is affordable. However, you may find that marine artisan insurance is slightly more expensive. This is due to the fact that boats can be expensive, which means there’s a higher degree of financial risk associated with working on them.

So what are the policies included in marine artisan insurance? The types of protection you can get varies from carrier to carrier. However, in general, the following are what you’ll always find:

• General liability

• Professional liability

• Pollution liability

• Equipment and tools coverage

Marine Artisan General Liability Insurance

Marine artisan general liability insurance covers the cost of personal injuries or property damage the marine artisan directly caused. An optional product and completed operations can be added, which covers personal injuries and property damage caused by the delivery of a product or service.

Marine Artisan Professional Liability Insurance

Marine artisan professional liability insurance covers legal fees and compensatory payments should a marine artisan face claims alleging negligence, violation of good faith, inaccurate advice, and other covered causes. Note that professional liability only covers financial or economic loss. Marine artisans can purchase this as a claims-made policy or occurrence policy.

Marine Artisan Pollution Liability Insurance

Marine artisans that fix engines or plumbings can commit mistakes and cause the spillage of hazardous materials. Professional liability doesn’t cover this. Instead, the policy that provides protection is pollution liability insurance. Through this insurance policy, a marine artisan can’t only pay for legal fees and settlements but also debris cleanup. This one kicks in if the spill happened during the job or the spill happened sometime after the marine artisan completed the project.

Marine Artisan Equipment and Tools Coverage

Equipment and tools coverage insures a marine artisan’s drills, harnesses, and other objects used for work. Some carriers offer this as an onsite or offsite policy. Onsite marine artisan equipment and tools coverage can be claimed when tools and equipment get damaged or lost while working. On the other hand, offsite equipment and tools coverage can be claimed if the tools and equipment got damaged while stored in the marine artisan’s garage or warehouse.

Learn more about commercial marine insurance

Artisan Contractor Insurance

As an artisan contractor, you’re providing a service that goes above and beyond what a normal handyman , construction , electrician , lawn care , plumbing, or roofing company would normally take care of.

Artisan contractors insurance is coverage for any contracting businesses that provide a specialized artisan service. Examples could include (but aren’t limited to):

• Custom cabinet builders.

• Custom landscapers or hardscapers.

• Mosaic artists or custom tile.

• Custom deck builders.

• Custom audio and speaker installation.

• Specialty lighting technicians or installers.

So what kinds of protection does artisan contractor insurance provide? A typical artisan contractor insurance includes:

• General liability

• Professional liability

• Employer’s liability (optional)

• Employment practices liability (optional)

• Cyber liability (can be endorsed or bought as a separate insurance policy)

• Equipment coverage (optional)

• Commercial auto insurance

Artisan Contractor General Liability Insurance

While working, you might accidentally hurt someone. Even if it’s not your fault, the injured person can contest the matter in a court of law and sue you for their injuries or property damage.

General liability insurance is underwritten to provide protection against such a situation. It will cover legal fees so that you’ll have quality defense and don’t incur significant losses. And if you lose the lawsuit, general liability will pay the aggrieved party on your behalf.

Say what if your product or service caused the injuries? Does general liability cover this? The answer is a yes and a no. Basic general liability insurance only covers injuries or property damage you yourself caused or allegedly caused. Decide to add products and completed operations to general liability for more protection.

General liability with products and completed operations coverage covers cost if your product or service caused injuries or property damage. Here are some example situations where this optional coverage can be very useful:

• You’re a woodworking artisan hired to make a fancy chair for a client’s porch. Weeks after the project was completed, the project demanded you pay for his injuries. Upon asking why, it turned out that the material used to make the chair isn’t sturdy enough. The finished chair can’t hold the client’s weight, which resulted in minor injuries.

• You’re a custom audio and speaker installation artisan hired by an amateur producer to work on his studio. Sometimes after the service was completed, the studio was engulfed in flames. Investigation revealed that the defective wiring of the sound system caused the fire. The client then asked you to reimburse his loss.

Artisan Contractor Professional Liability Insurance

Professional liability is the second protection included in artisan contractor insurance products. This one provides coverage if a client accuses you of causing economic or financial loss by committing negligence, false advice, and violation of good faith.

If you find the above explanation hard to understand, just remember that professional liability got your back if a client experiences losses because you committed or allegedly committed errors and omissions.

Note that professional liability is underwritten as a claims-made policy or occurrence policy. A claims-made professional liability can only provide coverage to incidents that happened while it’s in effect. On the other hand, an occurrence professional liability insurance provides coverage regardless if the covered peril happened while the policy duration is valid or has expired.

Artisan Contractor Employer’s Liability Insurance

Artisan contractors working with assistants should get employer’s liability insurance. The function of this policy is to take care of lawsuits employees file because of the following:

• Workplace injury

• Employer’s negligence

• Delayed or missing employee benefits

Unlike professional liability and general liability insurance, employer’s liability insurance is an optional inclusion. This means that you can decide to add or remove it. We strongly recommend that you do the former to have the best protection. You don’t need to get covered so much. An employer’s liability insurance offering $500,000 coverage will do.

Employment Practices Liability Insurance

Aside from workplace injuries, negligence, and missed employee benefits, other reasons why an artisan’s employees file a lawsuit is because of sexual harassment, wrongful termination, or discrimination. Employer’s liability insurance doesn’t cover these things. And what provides protection instead is employment practices liability insurance.

Employment practices liability insurance covers legal fees and compensatory payments if you find yourself facing sexual harassment claims wrongful termination claims, and discrimination claims. Just like employer’s liability, employment practices liability insurance is an optional policy - meaning that you can choose not to have it. Nonetheless, it’s better to include this in artisan contractor insurance for the best protection.

Artisan Contractor Cyber Liability Insurance

Some artisan contractors run a personal website to market their services, schedule projects, and collect payments from clients. A personal website can be hacked and sensitive data leaked. Some sensitive data stolen might be from customers. And if they incur losses after the breach, the artisan contractor in question is liable to compensate for losses.

Cyber liability insurance covers legal fees and settlements to concerned parties. This kicks in if sensitive data got leaked due to phishing, malware, and other types of cyberattacks. Note that this policy will also reimburse what you spent on customer notification and data breach containment.

Cyber liability is offered as a stand-alone policy. In other words, you’ll need to get this as separate insurance or ask your carrier to endorse it on your artisan contractor insurance. For the best protection, decide to get $1 million cyber liability coverage.

Artisan Contractor Equipment Coverage

The completion of each project doesn’t only depend on the expertise of an artisan contractor. The condition of work tools is also a determinant. Work tools in good condition make the work fast. On the other hand, defective work tools make the work slow or even delayed.

That’s why if you’re not thinking of self-insuring your work equipment, then get equipment coverage. Equipment coverage gives money so that you can get defective work tools repaired without incurring any cost. By the way, if work tools are less than three years old, then this policy will provide replacements too.

Equipment coverage doesn’t automatically insure all the work equipment in your possession. Understand that this insurance only applies to the work equipment you listed as covered. Another thing, equipment coverage is an optional policy, which you can decide to add or remove.

Also read: Contractor insurance

Artisan Use in Auto Insurance

If you hold a commercial auto insurance policy for a company vehicle, you may have realized that your policy charges slightly extra for ‘ artisan use .’ Although the extra coverage is typically only incrementally more expensive, this extra coverage is designed to cover the fact that you’re transporting specialty tools and materials for work (which often cost the insurer more to replace in the event of an accident).

That’s why, as an artisan using a cargo van or any other vehicle for work, decide to get commercial auto insurance as it’s cheaper but more comprehensive. Commercial auto insurance includes the following policies:

• Auto liability insurance

• Physical damage coverage

• Emergency roadside assistance

Auto liability insurance covers cost if you caused a vehicular accident and injured third parties or damaged property. This policy gives money so that you can pay lawyer fees, other legal costs, and settlements.

Physical damage coverage, on the other hand, protects your vehicle from damage. This is available as a collision physical damage coverage or comprehensive physical damage coverage. Collision physical damage coverage covers repair costs if your car got damaged after hitting a vehicle or an object. Comprehensive physical damage coverage, in contrast, covers damage resulting from theft, vandalism, arson, lightning, and extreme weather. Note that both types of physical damage coverage don’t cover normal wear and tear.

Learn more about car insurance

Artisan Insurance Cost

With so many different types of artisans, you may be wondering how much artisan insurance costs. The amount you’ll pay for insurance coverage depends almost entirely on the type of artisan service that you provide. Greater levels of financial or physical risk correspond to more expensive premiums. 

To help you figure out how much you’ll need to set aside for your artisan business insurance, we’ve put together a table with some ballpark figures that you can expect to pay on $1 million general liability insurance for different types of artisan businesses. Let’s take a look! 

Here’s another table that shows the pricing of the recommended artisan insurance companies:

How to Get an Affordable Artisan and Service Contractor Policy

Always decide to get a high deductible. Having a high deductible will significantly cut your rates even if you’re a high-risk customer. The second thing to do is to think about which policies you need and don’t need. Artisan insurance has a lot of policies included. However, not all apply to your line of work. Therefore, you can save money if you only invest in insurance policies that are practically useful. For example, pollution liability is only useful for artisans who deal with hazardous substances. Artisans, such as crafters, don’t have a use for it. 

One final thing, If you want to get an affordable artisan and service contractor policy, the best thing you can do is to shop around and compare artisan insurance quotes from competing insurance companies. Rates can vary heavily from one state to another, and you never know when a certain insurance provider is offering special entry rates or deals to new clients. 

To compare your artisan insurance quotes today and get cheap, reliable coverage, click the ‘ Get Quotes ’ button below! All you need to do is follow the process, enter some preliminary information on your business and you’ll be presented with offers from some of the best artisan insurance companies and coverage options in the market and be able to find a policy that fit your commercial needs and your budget!