Some of the products on this page come from partners who may compensate us when you click on their links or take specific actions. This helps us keep our content free. That said, our opinions are our own and based on independent analysis.
Around 28 million Americans move each year, and the average individual moves 12 times in their lifetime. Perhaps this is the reason why moving businesses thrive in the United States. The estimated collective revenue of all 9,535 moving companies is $23 billion.
Moving company insurance covers moving businesses from various risks involved with operating in this industry and line of business. Commercial moving insurance coverage is required for every moving business by law. The following guide will help you understand how insurance for moving companies helps you as a business owner, what are the best moving company insurance carriers, how much moving business insurance coverage you need, its costs, and much more. Move on!
Also read:
Moving Business Insurance: Definition
Business insurance for moving companies provides coverage to unique moving company business risks. This is a policy that your moving business must get aside from released value protection and full value protection, which the FMCSA requires interstate movers to have (more about this later on).
Another term for moving business insurance is van lines insurance. This is because moving companies is also called van line companies.
So how does moving insurance work? In essence, insurance for moving businesses provides protection from client personal injury or property damage lawsuits as caused by accidents in the workplace, service provided, or errors and omissions. This will also take care of lawsuits from hired laborers who aren’t part of your company’s payroll. To be clearer, what takes care of such lawsuits are liability policies included in insurance for moving company.
Movers insurance can be paired with other business insurance policies. Moving insurance works hand-in-hand with such policies to cover client possessions lost or damaged while in storage or transit, missed employee compensation, and many more. We’ll discuss these other policies in the later parts of this guide. For now, let’s talk about the different kinds of moving company liability insurance.
What are Full Value Protection and Release Value Protection?
The FMCSA mandates interstate movers to offer full value protection and release value protection. Note that just like 3rd party moving insurance, full value protection and release value protection plans are not for your moving business but for your customer. You must offer release value protection for free. On the other hand, full value protection will cost your customer 1% to 2% of their property’s total value.
The United States doesn’t have any stipulation laying out the specific moving company insurance requirements. It’s up to you if you want to get insured or not. Nonetheless, the District of Columbia Department of Insurance recommends that moving businesses should have cargo insurance, commercial auto insurance, general liability insurance, and umbrella liability insurance.
Liability Insurance for Moving Company: General Liability, Professional Liability, and More!
Liability policies are always included in mover insurance. These are moving company general liability insurance, professional liability insurance, employer’s liability insurance, carrier legal liability insurance, and cyber liability insurance.
General Liability Insurance for Moving Company
General liability insurance is the ever-present liability policy you’ll find in business insurance for moving companies. It’s safe to say that professional liability insurance and other liability coverages we will discuss can be excluded by your carrier but never general liability insurance. This is because protection begins with it.
Personal injury lawsuits or property damage your services dealt to the client is what general liability insurance takes care of. Examples of the most common scenarios where this insurance applies are:
- While getting the items to be moved, you dropped one of the client’s property and damaged it
- You injured the client unintentionally while loading or unloading their things
Professional Liability Insurance for a Moving Company
Professional liability insurance for moving company provides coverage when you face a lawsuit and are asked to compensate because you committed negligence, violation of good faith, misrepresentation, or inaccurate advice. This type of movers liability insurance doesn’t take care of personal injuries or property damage. Professional liability will only pay the client for their economic or financial loss. Common scenarios where professional liability provides coverage for a business mover are:
- Failure to meet deadlines
- Swapping a client’s belonging with another person’s belonging
- Failure to follow the terms and conditions of the contract
Employer’s Liability Insurance for Movers
Employer’s liability insurance is a type of moving liability insurance that’s automatically included in mover’s workers comp insurance. What this moving company liability insurance does is help you pay for defense costs and compensation. In moving businesses, the most common scenarios where employer’s liability insurance applies are:
- When an employee suffers from a severe sprain
- When an employee slipped or fell
- When an employee gets injured by a dangerous object being moved
- When an employee gets injured by the client’s pet
Carrier Legal Liability Insurance
Last but not least is carrier legal liability insurance. As we said earlier, your general liability insurance won’t provide coverage if the client’s belongings got damaged while in transit or in the storehouse. And so, you have to find another policy. This other policy we’re referring to is carrier legal liability insurance for moving and storage companies. In brief, this policy provides coverage to client belongings under your possession and will give you money in case such belongings got damaged.
Do I Need to Purchase Other Insurance Policies?
But what kind of insurance do you need for a moving company aside from the liability policies mentioned above?
Cargo insurance for moving companies. Moving company cargo insurance takes effect if your client’s belongings get damaged while in transit. Yes, in a way, cargo insurance for movers works the same way as carrier legal liability policy. However, it might be better as it has more generous limits.
You also need to get insurance for moving truck. This can be either a commercial auto insurance or a motor carrier policy .
Don’t forget to get workers compensation insurance too. Forgetting to get this policy is an infringement of the law. You also need this so that you don’t pay for employee hospitalization and compensate for lost income.
Sometimes, the client might require you to do business under the premise of a bailee-bailor relationship. And so, cargo insurance or carrier legal liability policy might not provide coverage in case you damaged the client’s property. To ensure you have protection, get bailee’s customer floater, which also provides money if ever the client’s property got damaged in your custody because of fire, theft, lightning, flood, vehicular accident, and more.
What is a COI for Moving Companies?
A certificate of insurance for movers or moving company COI is a document showing what insurance policies you currently have. It also shows the amount of money you can get from your insurance policy.
Clients will only work with an insured moving company, and this is why having a COI is important. Don’t worry because right now, a moving company certificate of insurance is offered as soon as you decide to get insured.
Do you pay to furnish a copy? A moving company insurance certificate is free, and many states prohibit carriers from charging a fee if a policyholder wants to get their copy of COI insurance for moving business. On another note, COI for moving company can be published in digital form and in paper form.
How Much Moving Company Insurance Coverage Do You Need?
The amount of moving insurance coverage you need heavily depends on the scale of your business operations. Practically, you should get at least $1 million general liability insurance for movers. The same also goes for professional liability insurance.
As for other moving company insurance programs, you should decide to get $1 million up to $2 million employer’s liability insurance. As for cyber liability, it will be fine if you only have $500,000 coverage. Most carriers offer $1 million cyber liability by the way. And so, look for moving insurance companies that offer custom cyber insurance limits. As for carrier legal liability insurance, a $2 million coverage will do just fine.
Compare Moving Business Insurance Quotes Online
Get all the best quotes from leading providers in a click of a button!
Moving Company Insurance Cost
So how much is moving insurance? Many factors affect moving insurance rates. To give you an idea, we’ll give pricing based on the type of policy, its limits, and the type of moving business to be insured.
- Moving businesses pay $104.16 a month or $1,250 a year for a $1 million general liability insurance
- Moving businesses pay $80 a month or $960 a year for a $1 million professional liability insurance
- Movers insurance cost for a $1 million employer’s liability insurance is $125 a month or $1,500 a year
- The cost of $1 million cyber liability insurance for moving companies is $70.83 a month or $850 a year
- Moving companies pay $103 a month or $1,236 a year for a $1 million carrier legal liability policy
There are different types of moving companies. And so, we see it fit to show moving insurance cost based on this criteria. Please refer to the table below:
| Monthly Rate | Annual Rate | |
|---|---|---|
| Local Moving Companies | $89 | $1,068 |
| Long Distance Moving Companies | $145 | $1,740 |
| Interstate Moving Companies | $130 | $1,560 |
| Cross Country Moving Companies | $90 | $1,080 |
| Moving and Storage Companies | $140 | $1,680 |
| Household Movers | $82 | $984 |
This table shows the rates of the best moving insurance companies for further reference:
| Monthly Rate | Annual Rate | |
|---|---|---|
| CoverWallet | $36.29 | $435.48 |
| Thimble | $40 | $480 |
| Hiscox | $42 | $504 |
| Aegis | $55 | $660 |
| On The Move Insurance Agency | $60 | $720 |
How Much are Moving Services in the US?
The average cost of movers in the United States is $600 – $13,000 for a full service and $56 – $3,200 for transport vehicle rental.
Rank and Review Insurance Companies
Help others make better decisions
Show more
Best Moving Insurance Companies
CoverWallet
You should know that CoverWallet isn’t an insurance company, and it offers the moving company insurance of its partners. But still, it ranks first in our review due to very positive feedback from customers and industry watchdogs like Better Business Bureau.
Use CoverWallet’s intelligent online quotation tool to find moving business insurance quotes. Compare them and if you’ve made a decision, there’s no need to contact an agent because CoverWallet allows you to buy the policies of its partners immediately.
Average cost: $36.29 per month
Our rating: 10/10
Pros
- CoverWallet can get you insured within minutes
- Gives you the cheapest moving business insurance quotes
- Offers moving insurance nyc and other locations in the US
Cons
- Not an insurance company but an online insurance broker
Thimble
Thimble’s moving company insurance only offers general liability. Nonetheless, this is fine as you can get insured fast. Thimble’s general liability for moving companies offers protection against 3rd party non-employee bodily injury, 3rd party property damage, and excessive defense costs.
If you’re looking for other policies, know that Thimble got you covered because it offers commercial auto insurance, workers comp insurance, and more. Just like CoverWallet, Thimble offers movers insurance nyc and other locations in the United States.
Average cost: $40 per month
Our rating: 9/10
Pros
- Insures moving companies and their employees
- Has on-demand or short-term moving company insurance policies
Cons
- Thimble’s moving company insurance only includes general liability coverage
Hiscox
Hiscox covers a wide variety of businesses so you can also get covered even if it doesn’t expressly state that it has moving company insurance. Hiscox has cargo insurance, commercial auto insurance, and liability policies. Let Hiscox insure you and enjoy generous policy limits starting from $1 million up to more than $10 million.
Average cost: $42 per month
Our rating: 9/10
Pros
- High policy limits
- Offers insurance policies for small and big moving companies
Cons
- Some insurance policies for movers are not offered by Hiscox in the United States
Aegis Moving Business Insurance
Aegis has a specialized insurance policy for moving businesses called MoveShield offering general liability, cyber liability, employer’s liability, commercial auto, cargo, surety bonds, and other insurance policies you will find very useful.
Best for: Moving business insurance with a lot of available policies
Average cost: $55 per month
Our rating: 8/10
Pros
- MoveShield protection includes many moving business insurance policies that other carriers offer as stand-alone policies
Cons
- Doesn’t offer online policy management unlike CoverWallet and Thimble
