CLICK HERE for the slides from the May 29, COVID-19 Town Hall: NY’s Safety Guidance for the Construction Industry. This PowerPoint touches on everything that deals with safety in the workplace for construction employers.
Further, it seems to make decent sense from a work safety standpoint. We suggest you forward this to your P.M.’s and your safety personnel to make sure your construction firm is thinking about these issues these next few months.
Unfortunately, this problem does not seem to be going away anytime soon. Especially in the workplace, we need to demonstrate safety precautions for our workers in the midst of a global pandemic. Addressing safety measures can be a good review for the post-pandemic workplace. Hopefully, this event will create safer work sites for the construction industry, as well as all the other workplaces around New York.
Welcome to the “abnormal”, at least for the next few months.
Still have a few questions? Contact a risk advisor today at 914-357-8444. Or, visit us at our website here.
This is just a quick reminder to all our clients and friends that as of December 1st, 2019 per Local Law 196 of 2017, Site Safety Training or SST, workers at job sites requiring a Construction Superintendent, Site Safety Coordinator or Site Safety Manager must have a total of 30 hours of safety training by December 1, 2019 and a total of 40 hours by September 2020. Supervisors must have 62 hours of training by December 1, 2019.
Further for General Contractors (G.C.’s), every site must post worker safety information posters as each job site they are running where safety is required. This was effective as of October 14th, 2019.
Per the NYC Department of Buildings (DOB), the signs must contain the following attributes.
Contain specific information about required worker safety training, including all site safety training deadlines and the number of required training hours, and the information must
Be in all languages used by workers to communicate at the construction site. In addition, the signs must
Be clearly visible to workers and must be posted at the construction site as follows:
Sites with construction fencing must post a sign at each egress point on the inside of the construction fencing, including vehicle delivery fence gates and existing loading docks.
Sites without construction fencing must post a sign at each egress point within the controlled access zone where construction is taking place and at each existing loading dock or location used for construction delivery or access.
To comply with the new requirements, the posted sign must:
be 44 inches wide and 30 inches high;
have letters at least 1 inch (25 mm) high;
have white letters on a blue background; and
be made of a durable and weatherproof material such as vinyl, plastic, or aluminum that is flame retardant.
The NYC DOB also was kind enough to build out templates in various languages for a diverse workforce population. If you wish to obtain a Site Safety Poster in a different language than English CLICK HERE.
Any questions we recommend so speak directly with Complete Safety Services, LLC Sinead O’Flaherty. CLICK HERE to contact Sinead.
Do you want the secret in understanding how the insurance marketplace prices your construction liability insurance policy renewals? This is an instructional piece to be shared with your staff members in charge of assisting in the design and purchase of your insurance program.
Throughout my 30 year career, I have found it especially advantageous to have a clear understanding of what the other side is trying to accomplish, and how they execute. Too often CFO’s and owners of businesses lead with how they “feel” about their company and how the insurance marketplace SHOULD price their account. Often their feelings are far from reality. Here is a primer so you know how to properly position your account, set expectations and beat your competition.
The Parameters Underwriters Use To Build Your Underwriting Risk Profile :
Every good insurance broker should be framing your company’s Risk Profile so you and they control the narrative. The Risk Profile is essentially the main underwriting package or submission the brokerage community makes on your behalf. The goal is to transfer as much risk as possible to the insurance marketplace for the lowest possible premiums. This creates the most value for you the end-user buyer. Too often insurance buyers don’t transfer nearly enough risk, simply jumping at the lower premiums incorrectly assuming the coverage they are getting is equal. THERE IS NOTHING MORE EXPENSIVE THAN A CHEAP INSURANCE POLICY!! PERIOD!
How Do You Make Your Money ?
What the insurance underwriter is trying to understand is what is your “craft” , how do you make your money. In construction, your business model coupled with your means and methods is a very big deal.
If your company does masonry work they need far more detail than simply “masonry”. Are you only doing flatwork, or do you work at heights? If you work at heights; how high to you go up? Whose your end-user client? Condo’s Co-op’s, parking garages, commercial warehouse, municipalities?
How you answer these questions helps both the broker placing the risk AND the underwriter who is deciding what coverage’s to give, what exclusions to put on the policy and how much premium to charge.
We suggest that you have a well thought out descriptive write up about your company in advance which helps build your “Risk Profile”. In the absence of this, you are leaving much to chance as this is not optimal for any stakeholders.
Where Do You Make Your Money ?
Your geographic footprint is very important. Insurance rates and claims experience is VERY local. The local laws really drive claims up or down contingent on the geographic region. Each locale has it’s own challenges and opportunities. Further, many insurance carriers restrict coverage in “hard market” locations where the challenges are acute like all of New York State due to the Labor Law and or “worse” New York City. If your operation is countrywide or international we need to know that too as this affects coverage design and pricing. It’s important you disclose this. Often the carrier wants to know what % of sales come from each geographic region.
QUICK TIP:The higher the Risk Profile, the more risk the insurance carrier takes on which usually means they will charge more premiums in exchange for that risk.
What Are Your Results ?
This is where the rubber meets the road. Our customers at Metropolitan Risk understand the price companies pay for their insurance premiums are a function of how well they prevent and manage their claims. We did a short little video called “What’s the Most Important Metric When Evaluating Your Future Liability Insurance Costs.” If you haven’t seen it in we highly recommend it.
Spoiler alert, it’s about what your loss pic is by line of insurance. Your Loss pic essentially determines how profitable your account has been to the insurance marketplace over the prior 5 years. It’s simple if the carriers lost money on your account, expect a price increase. If they made money on your account you should be fairly flat contingent on the overall market. If the carriers are making a lot of money on your account, you should do really well at renewal. Every company should have its companies most current loss pic at their fingertips at all times. This is a GREAT leading indicator. Your actual insurance renewal is a lagging indicator.
How Many Times Have You Switched Carriers?
This is a simple concept. If your account is on the street every year and your bidding out the insurance annually the underwriters know this. In most markets, there are only a few insurance carriers that have an appetite for your risk profile. Like clockwork, the submission comes in, usually from different brokers. Most insurance carrier underwriter hate this. They see it for what it is. A short term situation whereby they are renting your account for a year or 2 and then you’re off to the next dance partner. After a few submissions like this, the underwriters cease to give your file the consideration it deserves. At Metropolitan Risk we believe this really hurts the company who does this. The brokers don’t care as it’s not their story or reputation.
QUICK TIP:You should not put your account on the street every year. Once every 3 to 4 years is best practice unless you have coverage concerns or problematic exclusions that are jamming you up.
Best Practice Additions :
Here is where most other brokerage’s stop. At Metropolitan Risk we believe these next few additions make a HUGE difference. We have the testimonials to prove it.
A) Company Org Chart :
If your properly staffed with safety personal, in-house legal counsel, HR Admins, Project Managers & Coordinators we encourage you to highlight this. If you’re staffed properly this is a strength of your organization. We believe there is a direct correlation to being properly staffed forward and you lagging claims results. Companies that are staffed thinly tend to have far higher losses.
B) What About Your Company Is Unique?
What are you doing as a company that’s different, unique, special, that sets you apart from your competition? Do you have a competitive advantage in your native market that makes you more competitive, increases your quality or your margins? Let’s talk about this. Those same qualities may help lower your risk profile too. We need to tell that story.
C) Got Claims? :
The carriers are going to see the losses on your claims history so there’s no hiding it. Instead lets’ talk about them. Why they happened and more importantly what changes you have made to make sure they don’t happen again. This is really important as we are asking the underwriter to discount the historical claims performance of the account. We need to give them something of substance here so they can go to management and argue for us as to why the past won’t be prologue.
D) Don’t Just Say; Show It!:
If you’re telling a good story above in B or C back it up. Show some physical evidence to the underwriter you are doing this. Too often both the brokers and the businesses they represent tell a good “story” but it’s a story of fiction at worse, a story of gross embellishment at best. Adding reports, minutes to meetings, something that adds credence that you are actually doing what you say your doing’ that is powerful!
E) Who’s Telling Your Story?
We probably should have lead with this. If you were smart enough to follow the entire submission blueprint above don’t forget the most important part. Have (1) broker submit your application to the marketplace. If your preference is to use two brokers that’s your preference however please be sure to control your story. Nothing is worse than when (1) underwriter gets 2 entirely different submissions from 2 different brokers. You only have (1) shot at a good first impression. We did a great short little video on this called HOLDING ON TO YOUR STORY.
A good underwriter is not going to take the time to figure out which submission is the “correct” one. Instead, both brokers and the company they represent lose all credibility and the underwriter moves on to the next file. The bottom line controls your story. The best way to do that has one broker represent you in the marketplace. IF you don’t trust they will get you the best price and coverage combination, then you have the wrong broker.
If you would like to see what a Best Practices Submission looks like speak with a Risk Advisor by calling (914) 357-8444 or CLICK HERE to Schedule a 5-minute call!
There is a secret to knowing your construction liability insurance renewal pricing months early.
What if we told you that you could predict within a reasonable variance how much your construction liability insurance pricing will change at your renewal? Crazy helpful huh? Well, look no more for a solution to your problem.
If you do not have proper CLI and you are a contractor in construction, get a good policy right now! Here is a great article on why it is so important to have.
It’s a simple calculation that the commercial insurance marketplace uses to determine your insurance renewal pricing. CLICK HERE to get an idea if your construction liability insurance pricing will increase or decrease!
Usually, the calculation uses different formulas and algorithms that take into account previous losses, claim numbers, payroll amounts, location, etc. to figure out how much your company will lose this year and in the future. All of this is to figure out a new renewal price for your insurance policy that seems to be based on this amount of losses so that the insurance company ends up green for the year.
Still confused? Still have questions regarding this type of insurance? You can contact a professional risk advisor today at 914-357-8444. Or, you can visit our website for more information here.
In addition to a number of site safety prerequisites regarding construction superintendents local law 204 necessitates pre-shift safety meetings for workers at construction sites.
A permit holder who requires a site safety manager, site safety coordinator and construction superintendent must have a safety meeting with workers who are on site and under a permit holder or by a performing subcontractor. It is imperative that this meeting takes place before the initiation of any construction or demolition work.
Hold the safety meeting under these following conditions:
Have a Competent Person Conduct the Pre-Shift Safety Meetings: When the permit holder designates this person, they must have a pre-shift safety meeting before the commencement of any construction or demolition work. The competent person must be able to communicate with each worker at the meeting.
Click Here to Read More About Competent Workers.
2. The Pre-Shift Meeting Content: The meeting covers a review of the activities and duties to accomplish during the shift, along with detailed information regarding the safety and risks associated with specific tasks.
3. Records: The permit holder must maintain a record for each worker and meetings must be held once a week. The records must include the following:
The name, title and company associated to each worker who has participated.
The name, title and company association of the competent person who held the meeting along with their signature.
The date and time of the meeting.
This law has taken effect as of May 16th, 2018. The commissioner of buildings may take certain measures such as promoting rules to ensure the implementation of the law.
Stay ahead of the curve and speak with one of our risk advisors today!
There is a contractual issue and an insurance issue which, together, combine to create a “perfect storm” liability exposure for Owners/Developers and Contractors.
The exposure begins with the contracts you sign.Most state the contractor’s liability under the contract is not limited by the insurance coverage limits specified.
This exposure is then magnified by the fact that in many insurance policies the additional insured endorsements now contain wording to the effect that the additional insureds are covered for the lesser of the policy limit or the limit specified in the contract.
This “perfect storm” creates a potential uninsured risk to each of you.
For example, as a contractor:
You are required by contract to add the Owner/Developer or GC as an additional insured to your Liability policies.You do so.
That contract requires you to maintain a limit of $1,000,000.Since your insurance policies provide you with a total of $5,000,000 you feel you are fully protected.
Then there is a loss, due to your negligence, totaling $1,500,000.This is when you find out that things may not be so fine.
Your policy contained one of those additional insured limiting endorsements.The additional insureds would therefore only be covered by your policy for the first $1,000,000 as required by the contract.However, under that contract you are still required to defend and indemnify the additional insureds for the full loss.Where are you covering them for the next $500,000?Take a guess.That’s right – it would be out of your own pocket!
As the Owner/Developer or GC under the above example:
Are you ready to place your fate in the hands of the contractor’s ability to self-fund any losses beyond the insurance limits required in the contract?
Sure, you have your own insurance as the ultimate protection.However, any claims paid will negatively impact your premiums for the next 5 years.The increased cost could hurt your ability to compete for jobs.
The solution is simple and would add no additional cost to his bid.First, make sure you are requiring a limit which is sufficient for the exposure.Next, check the limit the contractor is showing on his certificate of insurance.If his available limit is higher, change the contract to match that limit.Example: You feel the exposure requires a limit of $1,000,000.The contractor’s certificate of insurance shows he has a limit of $5,000,000.You then change the contract to require a limit of $5,000,000.
Also make sure to ask about Risk Rocket! Risk Rocket is our insurance verification and analysis system designed for General Contractors, Developers and Real Estate Owners that do not want to rely solely on the Certificates of Insurance their Sub Contractors or Contractors provide.
