What is a Certificate of Insurance and how to I get one?
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Let’s talk about certificates of insurance and how to get one. So a certificate of insurance is a piece of paper that provides a basic summary of the insurance coverage that you have to someone called a certificate holder. Certificate holders, basically an entity or individual whose name and address are on the bottom left-hand corner of the certificate of insurance seen here. That does not give any rights to the certificate holder. It just provides them a very basic summary of your limit and when your policy starts and ends.
Sometimes they’ll ask to be listed as additional insured. And people think that that happens on the certificate of insurance. It does not. That’s an actual change, an endorsement to your policy, that has to be added on. And sometimes it carries a charge. The addition insured can be reflected on a certificate of insurance but it’s not given by the certificate of insurance. The certificate is not the policy. It’s just a brief summary.
Most of our customers add certificate holders through their online dashboard on our website. They can do that 24 hours a day or seven days a week. It’s the fastest way to get it done. Some customers send in an email with the certificate holder name and address and our office issues them. They take a little longer, could be 24 or 48 hours. And if there’s an additional insured endorsement that’s needed, we may need some additional information in order to request that from the carrier. And that may also take a slightly longer 48 to 72 hours.
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