General liability with the right certificates.

Coverage A, B and C: the three parts of a standard CGL form

The standard commercial general liability (CGL) form comes from the Insurance Services Office (ISO), which introduced it in 1986. The occurrence version is CG 00 01; its April 2013 edition is CG 00 01 04 13. Carriers also use their own forms; I check the form number.

• Coverage A, bodily injury and property damage. An agreement to pay damages an insured is legally liable for because of bodily injury or property damage, plus a separate promise to defend suits seeking damages potentially covered by it, all subject to the exclusions. The products-completed operations hazard, meaning your products and work you have completed or abandoned, falls under this part.
• Coverage B, personal and advertising injury. IRMI lists the personal injury offenses as unlawful arrest, detention or jailing, malicious prosecution, unjustified eviction, slander, libel and invasion of privacy. The advertising offenses, tied to advertising your goods or services, are libel, slander, invasion of privacy, copyright infringement and misappropriation of advertising ideas. The standard form has combined the two into one defined term since 1998.
• Coverage C, medical payments. A separate insuring agreement designed to reimburse others' medical or funeral expenses from bodily injury sustained by accident, without regard to whether you are liable, under the conditions the policy sets.

Occurrence vs. claims-made general liability

On an occurrence policy, the event giving rise to the claim has to happen within the policy period; the claim does not have to be reported during that period. A claims-made policy responds to a claim first made against you during the policy period. IRMI notes claims-made triggers are only occasionally found in CGL policies. ISO's claims-made version is CG 00 02, and the ACORD 25 shows which you have with a CLAIMS-MADE or OCCUR box.

In the standard ISO claims-made form, per IRMI:

• Retroactive date. It eliminates coverage for bodily injury or property damage that occurred before that date. An insurer advancing it triggers the basic extended reporting period below, so compare retro dates when you renew or change carriers.
• Basic extended reporting period. Automatic, without additional charge, when the policy is cancelled or not renewed, the retro date is advanced, or it is replaced with an occurrence policy. An incident reported no later than 60 days after the policy ends gets five years for a claim to be made. For an incident never reported, the claim must be made within 60 days after the policy ends.
• Supplemental extended reporting period. Optional, requires additional premium, and must be elected in writing within 60 days after the policy ends. It begins only after the basic period ends and reinstates the aggregate limits.

Certificates vs. endorsements: what the paper does and doesn't do

An ACORD 25 certificate is evidence that a policy exists. The 2016/03 edition says it is issued as a matter of information only, confers no rights on the holder, does not amend, extend or alter the coverage, and is not a contract between the insurer or producer and the holder. It also warns that limits shown may have been reduced by paid claims. State rules vary:

• California: Insurance Code section 384 requires a certificate used as evidence of insurance in place of a policy copy to state that it is not an insurance policy and does not amend, extend or alter the coverage. It does not apply to a surplus line broker certificate as defined in section 48.
• Texas: Insurance Code section 1811.051 bars a property or casualty insurer or agent from issuing a certificate that alters, amends or extends the policy's coverage or terms, and says a certificate may not convey a contractual right to the holder.

Additional insured status comes from the policy, not the certificate. The form itself says that if the holder is an additional insured, the policy must have additional insured provisions or be endorsed, and if subrogation is waived, certain policies may require an endorsement (see waiver of subrogation). ISO's CG 20 10 additional insured endorsement is built around ongoing work, and CG 20 37 is the separate completed-operations form. When a contract requires both, I send the endorsement copies with the certificate. See certificate holder vs. additional insured and our certificate checker.

Official sources

• IRMI: Commercial general liability (CGL) policy
• IRMI (C. Stanovich, 2019): How the limits apply in the CGL policy
• IRMI (C. Stanovich, 2010): A high-level view of the CGL policy
• IRMI (C. Stanovich, 2012): The claims-made CGL policy
• FC&S (2014): Claims-made CGL form (CG 00 02 04 13)
• IRMI (C. Stanovich, 2006): Additional insured endorsements, a potential minefield (part 3)
• IRMI glossary: personal and advertising injury (with personal injury, advertising injury, medical payments, expected or intended, insured contract, professional services exclusion, occurrence basis, claims-made trigger, products-completed operations)
• California Insurance Code section 384 (california.public.law)
• Texas Insurance Code section 1811.051 (texas.public.law)
• ACORD 25 (2016/03) certificate of liability insurance, as published by The Ohio State University