Landscaping Insurance 101

If you are operating a landscaping business, one thing you need to do so legally and safely is landscaping insurance.

The term “landscaping insurance” is often used interchangeably with the term “lawn care insurance.”

Technically, landscaping is one type of lawn care business. There are others as well, such as lawn mowing, tree trimming, and so forth.

For the purpose of clarification, we are going to focus solely on the types of coverage a landscaper may need specifically.

That being said, shopping for landscaping insurance and shopping for lawn care business insurance are quite similar.

Landscaping is a broad form of lawn care that involves a wide range of activities and a large selection of tools and equipment.

As a landscaper, some of the work you perform might include lawn mowing, tree and shrub trimming, raking, gardening, composting and fertilizing, planting, weed pulling, hardscape design, excavation, grading, tree removal, and more.

Being as that is the case, the landscaping insurance you need to purchase might be more comprehensive than that which a more specialized lawn care business might need to buy.

Why Do You Need Custom Landscaping Insurance Coverage?

There are two basic reasons you need landscaping insurance. The first is that it is required to operate legally. The second is that you need to protect your business as you work.

Think about all the things that could potentially go wrong in the course of landscaping job. A falling tree branch could damage the client’s property. A treatment you use could kill your client’s plants. The client’s pet getting underfoot could cause one of your employees to fall and hurt themselves.

In situations like these, landscaping insurance can help to cover the associated costs and keep your business running smoothly.

What Kind of Insurance Does a Landscaping Company Need?

The exact landscapers insurance requirements will depend on your state. In most cases, however, you will at the very least need general liability insurance and commercial property coverage.

If you have any employees, you may also have a legal requirement to pay for workers’ compensation insurance.

But again, you probably should purchase a broader selection of insurance policies than those above. Since landscaping involves such diverse duties, your company needs ample protection.

Benefits of Landscapers Insurance

Here are the advantages of insuring your landscaping business:

• Start your business legally. The first major advantage of getting landscaping insurance is that you can actually operate! Get your business out of the planning stages and start making money.

• Protect expensive equipment. Landscaping equipment might include excavators, various types of loaders, bulldozers, telehandlers, snow plows, and more. If your equipment is damaged or stolen, repairing or replacing it yourself could cost an arm and a leg. You will be glad that your insurance has kicked in to cover these costs.

• Cover medical costs. When you are working with heavy equipment, the risk of injury is significant. This is also true if you are cutting tree branches, or even if you are doing a small task in the garden using shears. Landscaping insurance will help cover medical costs if you are someone else is injured.

• Cover legal fees. If a client should sue you, the court fees could add up. But with landscaping insurance coverage, you may not need to go broke defending yourself. You might also be able to avoid legal action altogether if your insurance covers other costs (i.e. a client’s medical bills).

• Strengthen your reputation. If your landscaping business is insured, you can share that information on your website and social media profiles. It tells clients you are legally operating and that they can trust you with their business.

• Reduce interruptions to your business. If you do not have coverage when something goes wrong, it is not just money you lose fixing it, but also time. And in business, time is money, so the financial costs you can incur may far exceed the price of your bills. Stop lost profits from adding up with quality insurance policies.

• Improve your relationship with your workers. When your employees know you are protecting them with quality insurance, they will feel safer and more appreciated working with you. In fact, just having insurance may help you attract more competitive talent.

Types of Landscaping Insurance

• Commercial General Liability Insurance: This is the most basic type of insurance you can purchase for your landscaping business. If there are damages or injuries to clients or their property, your general liability insurance can help cover the costs.

• Commercial Automobile Insurance: You can purchase this type of insurance to cover the vehicle you use to drive to and from client sites and transport your equipment.

• Commercial Property Insurance: General liability insurance covers damage to a client’s property, but not your own. To cover damage to your property, you need to purchase commercial property insurance. This type of coverage also will help you pay for a replacement if your equipment is stolen.

• Business Owner’s Policy: If you are looking for a way to make commercial property insurance and general liability insurance more affordable, you might be able to do so by bundling them together into a business owner’s policy (BOP).

• Professional Liability Insurance: This type of insurance is sometimes called “errors and omissions insurance,” which describes its purpose. If an error or omission results in a client wanting to sue you, you can cover legal fees and other costs with professional liability insurance.

• Inland Marine Insurance: To protect your tools and equipment from damage, you can buy inland marine insurance. As a landscaper, this is very important since you may have quite a lot of equipment that would be very expensive to repair or replace.

• Workers’ Compensation Insurance: If any of your employees are injured on the job, workers’ compensation insurance could help to offset their medical costs and lost wages.

• Employment Practices Liability Coverage: This it’s a form of coverage you can purchase to protect yourself from various types of employee lawsuits.

• Business Interruption Insurance: If damage to your equipment or offices makes it impossible for you to conduct your business for a period of time, business interruption insurance can help to cover your lost profits.

• Herbicide and Pesticide Application Insurance: If you apply an herbicide or pesticide that causes your client to get sick, this type of insurance may help protect you from legal costs.

• Cyber Liability Insurance: What if your website is hacked, and the personal data or payment information for your customers gets compromised? In situations like these, cyber liability insurance can come to your aid.

• Commercial Umbrella Insurance: Sometimes, the liability insurance you purchase may not provide you with as much coverage as you think you might need. By purchasing umbrella insurance, you can have additional coverage for those scenarios should they arise.

Factors Impacting the Cost of Insurance For Landscapers

Now you know what types of landscape business insurance coverage you might need to purchase. But how much will it cost?

To figure out how much you may need to pay for insuring your landscaping business, you need to consider all the factors that can influence pricing. Let’s go over those now.

• The insurance company. Which insurance company you choose to work with can impact your costs. Some offer more competitive pricing than others. The only way to find the best pricing for landscaping insurance is to shop around for different quotes.

• The policies you buy. The specific types of policies you choose to purchase may make insuring your landscaping business more or less expensive. The more types of policies you buy, the higher your costs for insurance will be. But you will also have more protection should you need it.

• The options you choose for your policies. For some types of policies, there are options. As an example, you can get either a cash value or replacement value commercial property insurance policy. The latter is more expensive but also a superior form of coverage.

• Your deductibles. How large or small your deductible is impacts the rates for which you qualify. By raising your deductible, you can lower your rates.

• Your coverage limits. Higher coverage limits will result in higher rates for your landscaping insurance policies, and vice versa. You can lower your insurance rates by lowering your coverage limits—though paying more for higher limits may be worth it.

• Your payroll. How large your payroll is (both in terms of hourly rates and number of employees) will impact the cost for workers’ compensation insurance. If you have a high payroll, expect higher costs for this type of insurance.

• Your location. The city and state in which you are operating your landscaping business will impact the cost for your landscaping business insurance coverage.

• Your revenue. The more money you bring in with your landscaping business, the more expensive it will be to ensure your venture.

• Your type of vehicle. If you are covering a vehicle, the make, model, age, and condition of the vehicle may all have an effect on what you need to pay to insure it.

• The value of the property you have to insure. The more expensive your equipment is, the more it will cost you to insure it.

• The duties you perform. As we mentioned previously, the duties of landscapers can vary considerably. There is a big difference between a business that handles excavation and grading to create landscapes and one that simply maintains landscapes that already exist. If your landscaping company creates landscapes rather than just maintains them, your insurance policies will probably be more expensive than they would otherwise.

• Bundling policies. If you bundle together multiple policies, you may be able to save money through a single insurer. They may all be landscaping business policies, or some of them might be other types of business policies or even general types of insurance like coverage for your home or private vehicles.

• Your claims. The longer you can go without making any large claims, the better it is for the insurance company. Sometimes insurers will eventually reward you with a discount for being a low-risk customer.    

Where to Find Landscape Business Insurance Coverage

Landscaping can be a rewarding and lucrative profession, but protecting your profits in case something goes wrong requires the right insurance policies for your business.

Now that you have a better idea of what types of policies might be applicable in your situation and what factors can impact costs, you are ready to get quotes.

To compare landscape business insurance policies now, complete our simple form below or give us a call. We will connect you to our recommended landscaping business insurers and help you save on your policies.