It’s fall, and it’s perfect weather for camping. If you want to be a happy camper when your insurance renewal comes around, here are two tips for you to think about when you are reviewing your property insurance.
First, review and update your building and contents values. Why is this important? As all of us know, construction costs continue to increase. Most likely, the insurance company will put some sort of inflation guard when issuing your renewal policy, but it’s important for you as the customer to look at those values. Ask yourself, “if this building or warehouse completely burned down, could I rebuild it to its same like and kindness?” You also need to look at the contents that are inside the building. If you took the building and turned it upside down and shook it, the contents include everything that would fall out of it. This means your desk chairs, your computers, but also your equipment.
If you’re a manufacturing facility, it includes your stock, your goods, and more.
Make sure that your agent is asking you to fill out & a statement of values which is an official form that says: these are our values for our building, this is the use of it, and it’s signed by me the client. That’s important.
The second tip is to fill out a business income worksheet. This is also really important. If your agent that you work with now doesn’t know what it is or doesn’t know how to help you fill it out, you might need to work with somebody new. You can call our Strate Insurance team, for example. The business income worksheet makes you go through the process of thinking about what kind of income or extra expenses would you incur if your normal business operations ceased. It’s a really good exercise. Most likely, your policy has business income coverage built in, but you don’t want that coverage to be less than it should be.
To recap, review and update those building and contents values and fill out that business income worksheet. Happy trails!
