What Your COI Actually Needs — and Why Subs Get It Wrong Wrong)

The certificate is the easy part. The endorsements are the work.

A Certificate of Insurance — usually an ACORD 25 — is a snapshot of your coverage. It lists your carrier, your limits, your policy dates. But a GC isn't asking for the snapshot. They're asking for the endorsements behind it — and that's where most subs come up short.

The four that matter

• Additional Insured. Names the GC, owner, or PM as an insured under your policy. Without the right AI endorsement, the certificate's "additional insured" checkbox means nothing.
• Primary & Non-Contributory. Your policy pays first; the AI's own policy doesn't have to contribute. Contract-required on most commercial work.
• Waiver of Subrogation. Stops your carrier from suing the AI after a claim. Required on most commercial work.
• 30-Day Notice of Cancellation. The AI gets warned before your coverage lapses.

Each of these is a separate endorsement. Most contractor policies issue one or two by default; the rest require issuance, sometimes at additional cost. If your COI says you carry them but your policy doesn't actually have the endorsements, you have a certificate that lies — and a claim that won't respond the way the GC expects.

Why subs get it wrong

Usually because their agent never mapped their contracts to their policy at bind. The sub forwards whatever ACORD their agent generates, the GC's risk manager flags the missing language, and now everyone's scrambling the day before the job. We fix this by reviewing your major contracts at bind — see how our COI workflow works. If you're a GC tired of chasing subs, we review their certificates too, before they hit the job.

Related reading: Additional Insured, Primary and Non-Contributory — Explained.