What You Should Know AboutPersonal Excess Liability Summer 2007 Issue
Our Automobile, Homeowners, or other personal policies provide you with primary Liability protection. If someone trips and falls on your property, Homeowners coverage is there to protect you. What happens, however, if the incident results in disfigurement, disability, or even death?
Catastrophic events can occur at almost any time to anyone. Your primary policies provide excellent protection, yet if your policy limits are exhausted you are responsible for the additional medical, legal, and/or other costs. These costs could easily drain your life savings and potentially force you to sell your home or deplete other assets you worked so hard to build.
Personal Excess Liability coverage is a great answer. This type of coverage affords you and your family with an "umbrella" of Liability protection that extends above all your primary insurance. With one policy, you increase all your Personal Liability by $1,000,000 or more, protecting your assets and ensuring that the injured person is fully compensated.
What primary policy requirements are there? There are two main requirements. First, you need to insure both your primary home and personal automobiles with us. Why? Excess or Umbrella policies are not standard in the market. Our Excess policy is designed to mesh with our underlying Auto and Homeowners policies to prevent inadvertent gaps in coverage. You also enjoy a combined multi-policy discount of 25% (20% for Auto and 5% for Homeowners).
You'll also need to carry a minimum limit of Liability for your Auto, Homeowners, and other personal policies. For Auto, it's $500,000 per person and $500,000 per occurrence; for Property, it's $300,000. As you can see in Table 1, the Excess policy sits on top of what we call the "underlying" coverage and picks up immediately after the Liability coverage on the underlying policy is exhausted.
What are some of the benefits of a CIG Excess policy?
- $1,000,000 to $5,000,000 limits available. (Additional limits are available on a case-by-case basis.)
- Convenience. By packaging all your business with us, you work with one company, saving you time. Let us take care of the rest.
- Cost effective. The average premium for $1,000,000 Excess coverage is $135 for a family with two vehicles and a home.
- Easy payment plans. You pay in full or combine the premiums of your Excess policy and your Auto, Homeowners, and other insurance you have with CIG, all on one convenient billing with only one service fee. We even waive the fee if you pay electronically through EFT.
- Peace of mind. Know your property is protected against catastrophic events.
What doesn't a Personal Excess policy cover? In general, a Personal Excess policy does not provide coverage in situations that are uninsurable (such as war); are not personal in nature (business or professional liability); are excluded by your Personal Auto or Homeowners policy; are intentional acts; or are covered by other insurance (such as Workers' Compensation).
Call your professional independent agent today to help choose the coverage that's right for you.