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How to Avoid Being Cancelled

September 2, 2021 By Forrest Dailey

Your homeowner’s insurance policy is easily the largest policy most people carry. Apart from your health insurance, it’s the policy that has the most riding on it. Which is why it can’t be understated, and must be understood that your policy can be cancelled or voided, and your claims denied, for various reasons.

* A “voided policy” means not only do you no longer have insurance, but for all intents and purposes, at the time of the event leading to your claim, you did not have insurance.

For example:

If your home is burglarized and it was determined that a door was left unlocked, it is unlikely your claim will be honored. Similarly, if you fail to keep up with essential maintenance of your home which leads to damage, your policy may be cancelled. Your policy should outline what “essential maintenance” is.

Conversely, if you do make major renovations on your home without informing your carrier, or if you misrepresent your property, your claims may not be honored. Remember even small things like changing the locks or installing pet doors affect the security of your home, and any resulting break-in claim may not be honored if the changes are not reported and are deemed the cause of the break-in.

If you start a business out of your home and don’t talk to your agent about it, it could put your homeowner’s insurance in jeopardy if (1) you have foot traffic in your home due to the business, (2) you have heavy and valuable machinery in the home, or (3) you have large amounts of inventory stored at home.

You may not be aware that even if you own your home outright, renting out a room without notifying the carrier can void your policy. Because you’ve essentially turned your home into an apartment building without notice. You’re now running a business under a homeowner’s policy. The assumption here is that if you rent out a room, it will be to someone you don’t know. If it is a close friend or relative staying with you for an extended period, that may be different, but you still should report this change to your agent.

It probably goes without saying that damage done to your house in the course of illegal activity will not be honored and may actually lead to the cancellation or void of your policy. What many policyholders fail to realize, though, is that this can happen even if the policyholder is unaware that the illegal activity was going on.

Speaking of illegal activity, to make claims on damage that you intentionally caused is obviously a fraudulent claim. But people often forget that a claim on an item you can’t prove you ever owned cannot be honored. That doesn’t mean that a claim like that is necessarily fraudulent. It may be as simple as not having receipts, or not having photographic or video proof of ownership. With a little foresight, though, you’ll be sure to be covered on these items.

It all comes down to communication. Your insurance carrier is providing coverage on your home. It stands to reason that an up-to-date, accurate account of what they are covering is essential to providing that coverage. It is in the policyholder’s best interest to be meticulous about it.

This One’s For the Independent Retailers

July 14, 2021 By Forrest Dailey

July is National Independent Retailers Month. As such, we would like to take this time to pay tribute to the small business owners who are the backbone of our local marketplaces. This is also a good opportunity to make note of some of the different insurance products that often go overlooked by small business owners.

We’ll split them up into three different areas:

(1) Your building and equipment

(2) Your product

(3) Your profits.

Your Building and Equipment

Your building is your home base. Maybe you run your business out of your home or even on-line. Same premise. If you don’t secure your location or your platform on which you do business, what have you got? Your location, quite literally, is the foundation upon which your business is built, and the insurance on your location is the foundation on all other insurance you put on your business is built.

You wouldn’t need any of the following if you didn’t secure your building or your online presence first. But think of it this way. Having all of the following reasons to insure your business means you are thriving or expect to be very soon. It means you have something worth protecting.

Equipment breakdown, whether it be mechanical, electrical, or computers, cooling equipment, boilers, etc., can foil your efforts in a big way. As a business owner you will want to have business interruption and utility interruption coverage, as well as coverage on specialty equipment that is unique to your industry, which very well may not be covered under a standard Business Owner’s Policy.

Your Product

Directly related to equipment breakdown, Food Spoilage Insurance covers a restaurant or grocery store owner from losses incurred when, say, refrigeration equipment fails and huge supplies of food are rendered unsellable.

Product liability insurance is a specific form of liability insurance that protects a business owner from liability for defects in products he/she sells if manufactured by a third party. Similarly, Product Recall insurance covers the expenses involved in sending a recalled product back to the manufacturer.

While we’re on the subject of inventory, let’s talk about automatic increase of coverage for seasonal inventory. Every type of business has a boom season. This should be accounted for in your business owner’s property and liability coverage. Just remember to discuss it with your agent to make sure the amount of increase matches the amount of increased inventory, and that it matches the season in which that increase occurs for you. Every industry has its idiosyncrasies.

Your profits

While it is true that you would not be in business in the first place were it not for your customers, without your customers, you could not make a profit. It is essential to protect that. It allows you to stay in business, more immediately, and it is also your nest egg, down the road.

Cyber crime is ever increasing as a peril of owning a business, but employee crime is another, even more overlooked area of commercial insurance, simply, probably, because employer like to think the best of the people filling the roles they themselves hired them for. But employers’ instinct is not perfect, and neither are employees. It does happen. If one of your employees steals from you or from your clients, your business owner’s policy can protect you from the fallout.

Money and Securities insurance covers you from the loss of large amounts of cash lost in the event of your business having a fire or other destructive calamity. Directly related, Extra Expense Coverage pays for costs beyond regular operating expenses, so your company can continue operating while a property loss that is covered by your insurance is being repaired or replaced.

You’ll notice that each area, in some way, encompasses your clientele. And where would you be without them? All of your insurance is there to protect you, but it is also there to make your business a more secure environment for your clientele, and to make your business a more reliable source of your product or service.

If you’re a business owner and are looking to more comprehensively protect your commercial assets, reach out to us today!

How Insurance Is Like a Frozen Pizza

June 23, 2021 By Forrest Dailey

People say insurance is boring. It’s one of those “no news is good news” situations. You buy your policy, maybe you set up automatic payments on the premium. If all goes well, you never have to think about it again, and that suits you just fine. Nobody is looking for a “cool” insurance policy. Nobody is getting the latest, trendy insurance because Taylor Swift said on TMZ that it’s the kind of policy she has. That is not insurance’s function.

Insurance is more like a frozen pizza.

You buy the pie with the specific toppings you like because you know when it comes time to eat it, that will be what you require. You need protein so you pick the meat lovers pizza. Or you get the three-cheese because it provides a fuller coverage of the crust. Maybe you like to live dangerously, so you get something with jalapenos.

Once you’ve thoroughly weighed your options and made your choice, you take your pizza home, put it in your freezer and move on with your life. You might forget it’s even there. Then one day, due to circumstance totally beyond your control, you forget to, or are unable to buy groceries. So you come home that Friday night and there is nothing to eat and you don’t feel like cooking even if there were.

This is a disaster, right? No. That good old reliable frozen pizza has you covered.

If, however, this day of reckoning doesn’t come, and you don’t get around to eating that pizza, after a year or so, you might want to look into getting a new one. There may be a new brand that is more appealing to you. This is a good chance to re-evaluate if you are still a pepperoni and mushrooms kind of person or if you’d like to try some new toppings. Over the last year, your life may have changed in many ways. Perhaps you’re entering a stage of life wherein pineapple and ham is right for you. Maybe you scrap marinara sauce altogether and go with alfredo.

There are a bewildering variety of pizzas to choose from these days. It helps if your local agent…I mean your grocer is well-informed enough to guide you through it all. Speaking of which, maybe you wake up one day and you realize you want to get your pizza from a grocery store where they treat you better. Maybe you heard that at another store, they get to know your pizza preferences and they keep in touch with you about the latest developments in thin crust.

What it boils down to is it has to be a pizza that, in a pinch, you’ll be glad is there. And the same goes for your insurance policy. Come see your nearest Horihan Insurance agent and we’ll see what we can cook up for you. May you never have to use it, but at least you’ll know it is there.

P.S. Since we brought it up, it may have been a long time since you last cooked a pizza. So please do not boil it.

The Thing About Life Insurance Rates As We Age

May 21, 2021 By Forrest Dailey

When you’re young you may not think you need life insurance, and even if you do, it isn’t the top priority in your life. So days go by. Days turn into months and years. When you finally decide it is time, it can be surprising how much it costs to start a life insurance policy. It is even more surprising (and kind of upsetting) to find out how much less it would have cost you 15 years earlier. If you are still in your twenties, we want to help you avoid having that “shoulda coulda woulda” moment years down the road.

It will be worth it.

If you’re already years down the road and you’re contemplating how you’re going to fit a new life insurance policy into your budget, we want to help you with that as well.

It is doable.

It can’t be stressed enough that if you have anyone in your life who depends on you, financially, you should have life insurance. Your kids may be off to college or starting their own lives but if you are married and your half of the household income accounts for half of the life you and your spouse maintain, you should have life insurance.

So let’s talk numbers.

It is true that the longer you wait, the more it will cost you to establish a life insurance policy. Generally, premiums you can expect to pay stay fairly stable into the mid-30s, but once you hit 40 things are a little different. Based on a $500,000, 20-year policy, averaging the cost for males and females at age 35 you’re at about $25 a month. For a forty-year-old, that average shoots up to about $35 a month. By age 45, that average is over $50. From there on every five years that dollar amount increases drastically. We’ll let you just take a look at this table for reference.

Remember that there are other factors involved – personal habits, family history which may alter these figures. If you’re 60 years old and still skydiving and whatnot, well that is going to require a conversation. In any case, the information in the link above is a good starting point, so you have an idea of what to expect going into a meeting with an agent about life insurance.

Also remember that we started with the premise of a 20-year policy. If you are closer to the age of our skydiver here, then you are also closer to retirement age.

Well, maybe.

If you’re living life to the fullest, you may very well be nowhere near ready to call it a career. But generally speaking, at that age you may feel that going with a shorter term (lower premium) plan makes the most sense for you, especially if you are planning to collect a pension at retirement. Horihan Insurance agents know that you know what’s best for you, but we’re here to give you the most knowledgeable, experience-based advice we can offer before signing you up for a plan. If you are ready to have a frank discussion about life insurance our nearest Horihan Insurance agent is ready, willing and able to work with you to make sure you get the most affordable and comprehensive coverage that you can get.

It really is never too late.

How to Avoid Being Cancelled

This One’s For the Independent Retailers

How Insurance Is Like a Frozen Pizza

The Thing About Life Insurance Rates As We Age

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