Vehicle insurance

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sawdust123

sawdust123

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Nov 10, 2006
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Ventura County, CA
I saw this discussed on FB and thought I would mention it raise it here. How is your vehicle covered?

I know many people use personal vehicles for DJing. This has liability associated with it. If you get into an accident on the way to a gig, your personal insurance may not cover you because you are using the vehicle for commercial purposes. If you get pulled over with a vehicle full of gear but show personal registration and insurance rather than commercial, you could be cited as well.

Now let's say you have your vehicle properly registered with your business and you have the proper commercial insurance on it. You break down on the way to a gig and call AAA. The tow truck driver can deny you service since you have commercial tags. You need towing insurance on your commercial policy. Also, a tow truck driver may refuse to tow a loaded vehicle, no matter how stuff is strapped down.

Food for thought.
 
sawdust123 said:
I saw this discussed on FB and thought I would mention it raise it here. How is your vehicle covered?

I know many people use personal vehicles for DJing. This has liability associated with it. If you get into an accident on the way to a gig, your personal insurance may not cover you because you are using the vehicle for commercial purposes. If you get pulled over with a vehicle full of gear but show personal registration and insurance rather than commercial, you could be cited as well.

Now let's say you have your vehicle properly registered with your business and you have the proper commercial insurance on it. You break down on the way to a gig and call AAA. The tow truck driver can deny you service since you have commercial tags. You need towing insurance on your commercial policy. Also, a tow truck driver may refuse to tow a loaded vehicle, no matter how stuff is strapped down.

Food for thought.
Click to expand...
I mentioned this in my reply to the question regarding sub contractors....
Regarding insurance - I don't believe the [policy try to discern what kind of insurance is on a vehicle, just that it is insured, if required by law.
There is also a difference at least in Canada in "business" use versus "commercial" use.

As an insurance adjuster, I use my "personal" vehicle daily going to and from work and to claims. I don't need "commercial" insurance - My policy though is endorser fop "business' use. Where as this is a vehicle I use personally, I can do that.

If you have a vehicle that is wrapped with your company logo and you use it exclusively for transporting gear (i.e. a van) - that likely mandate a commercial policy, with commercial; plates.

If you do not declare the use of the vehicle to your insurer, you could be guilty of non=disclosure or misrepresentation.
An insurer (after an accident) may; based on the misrepresentation, void ypour policy from inception... which means simply, you have no insurance.
 
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I saw the post on Facebook. This is something you might want to discuss with your insurance agent. I am sure the answers will depend on a whole range of factors, just remember there a plenty of people using there personal vehicle for Business purposes. I’d said it all depends on what you are doing with the vehicle, what type of Vehicle it is, how is registered and other factors. Let's say if you’re using your vehicles as Uber, taxi, have it Wrapped as a business vehicle with a ton of equipment, or towing business trailer, have multiple people driving the vehicle, operating as a multi op, well then you know there could definitely be an issue trying to use your personal coverage. But if you’re using your personal vehicle p/t then you’ll will likely be covered but not all equipment in the vehicle. My vehicle is registered passenger, my agent knows I’m DJ and it has never been issue. I have even had them issue the same type of Insurance certificates with the venue names as an additional insured as we do with our DJ liability insurance. Now AAA is really for personal usage as that is what you are paying for. So if you have commercial plates and/or a wrapped vehicle I Definitely see an issue. But you can alway call any tow truck company and pay them. They will tow you if you pay them and maybe the AAA sent tow company for a additional feel, the issue is knowing which company to call. I have had AAA change my tire and flat bed my van, but I have passenger plates. Fully load it would be a issue towing my van, at my repair shop they have to put it on a special truck lift. I’d say like with the DJ liability insurance, you have the regular setup you are fine. Add at photo booth, up lighting, dancers, put lighting over the head of the dancers, have a massive concert sound or lighting, playing for 2,000 people, any of those items, very likely that basic Policy won’t cover you.
 
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adj2ent said:
I saw the post on Facebook. This is something you might want to discuss with your insurance agent. I am sure the answers will depend on a whole range of factors, just remember there a plenty of people using there personal vehicle for Business purposes. I’d said it all depends on what you are doing with the vehicle, what type of Vehicle it is, how is registered and other factors. Let's say if you’re using your vehicles as Uber, taxi, have it Wrapped as a business vehicle with a ton of equipment, or towing business trailer, have multiple people driving the vehicle, operating as a multi op, well then you know there could definitely be an issue trying to use your personal coverage. But if you’re using your personal vehicle p/t then you’ll will likely be covered but not all equipment in the vehicle. My vehicle is registered passenger, my agent knows I’m DJ and it has never been issue. I have even had them issue the same type of Insurance certificates with the venue names as an additional insured as we do with our DJ liability insurance. Now AAA is really for personal usage as that is what you are paying for. So if you have commercial plates and/or a wrapped vehicle I Definitely see an issue. But you can alway call any tow truck company and pay them. They will tow you if you pay them and maybe the AAA sent tow company for a additional feel, the issue is knowing which company to call. I have had AAA change my tire and flat bed my van, but I have passenger plates. Fully load it would be a issue towing my van, at my repair shop they have to put it on a special truck lift. I’d say like with the DJ liability insurance, you have the regular setup you are fine. Add at photo booth, up lighting, dancers, put lighting over the head of the dancers, have a massive concert sound or lighting, playing for 2,000 people, any of those items, very likely that basic Policy won’t cover you.
Click to expand...

What your broker tells you and what an insurance company does after an accident might be two different things.
Typically insurer ask if you will be using the car toi go to work and they ask the miles traveled per day.
People commuting back and forth to work atr a greater risk that the person working from home.
Driving to a gig is one thing that they may be OK under a "personal" rating - transporting employees and or gear might not be acceptable.
UBER/Lyft/ Door Dash - definitely and issue. In my location all driver have to have the same class of licensed as a taxi driver.
Get in an accident where people get hurt, and they find out you were a driver for hire...... you could be an a world of hurt... although most of the larger ride share companies carry umbrella policies in this case as insurance cost for the driver would be so expensive, they would never be able to get drivers.
I believe in some provinces the law is that once you pick up the passenger your car is insured by the ride share company until you drop the fare off.
 
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Steve LeBlanc said:
although most of the larger ride share companies carry umbrella policies in this case as insurance cost for the driver would be so expensive, they would never be able to get drivers.
Click to expand...

Yeah they definitely couldn't. I owned taxis and later did some consulting/managing for a startup insurance was a killer almost $2800 per car and that was fleet insurance. That's a lot of pizzas delivered at 6 or 7 bucks. We looked at setting up a province wide ride share service before Uber came along insurance was one of the things that stopped us
 
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