If you work as a 1099 subcontractor in the trades, the general contractor you work for is not covering you.

Their policy protects them. Yours protects you. And the moment something goes wrong on a job — damage, an injury, a dispute — the question of whose coverage responds gets answered by what you carry, not by who hired you.

Most tradespeople find this out when a contractor asks for a certificate before releasing a check.

The Certificate Is Usually Why You’re Here

General contractors, remodelers, property managers, and builders require proof of insurance before they let you on a job. That is not a formality — it protects them at their own audit.

Here is what happens on their end. When their insurance company audits their books, any subcontractor who cannot produce a valid certificate showing general liability and workers’ compensation gets treated as the contractor’s own employee. The contractor pays additional premium on your contract value, at construction rates.

That is why they will not put you to work without a certificate, and why some will hold payment until they have one.

It also means your coverage is a competitive advantage. The sub who can produce a current certificate the same day gets the call. The one who says he’ll get back to them does not.

Florida Workers’ Compensation and the Exemption Question

This catches more tradespeople than anything else on this page, because the rules in construction are different from every other industry.

In most Florida businesses, a sole proprietor is automatically exempt from carrying workers’ compensation on themselves. In the construction industry, that is not the case. Sole proprietors and partners working in construction generally cannot exempt themselves the way a non-construction business owner can.

Corporate officers and LLC members in construction can apply for an exemption, but only if they meet ownership requirements and actually file for it with the state. An exemption you never filed for does not exist.

Two practical consequences.

Assuming you are exempt is not the same as being exempt. Verify your status rather than assuming it.

An exemption does not satisfy a contractor. Many general contractors require actual coverage regardless of exemption status, because an exemption does not protect them the way a policy does.

If you are working as a 1099 sub in the trades and have never looked at this, it is worth a conversation before your next audit or your next job.

Related coverage: Workers’ Compensation Insurance

General Liability Is the Foundation

General liability responds when your work causes bodily injury or property damage to someone else, and it funds your legal defense.

For a tradesperson that means the water you let into the unit below, the flooring you damaged getting material through, the customer who tripped over your cord, the neighboring property your equipment hit.

Two provisions worth understanding before you need them.

The “your work” exclusion means the policy does not pay to redo your own defective work. If the installation failed, correcting it is on you. What responds is the resulting damage.

Care, custody, and control excludes damage to property in your control and to the part of the property you are working on.

Between them, the claims that actually get paid are the ones where your work damaged something else — which is most of them.

Related coverage: General Liability Insurance

Your Personal Auto Policy Probably Does Not Cover You

This is the gap most 1099 tradespeople carry without knowing it.

Personal auto policies generally exclude or limit coverage for vehicles used in business. Driving to jobsites, hauling material, carrying tools, and towing a trailer are business use — and a serious accident on the way to a job can produce a denied claim on the vehicle you depend on.

If your truck is how you work, the policy on it needs to reflect that.

Related coverage: Business Auto Insurance

Your Tools Are Not Covered by Your Homeowners Policy

Tools stolen from a truck or a jobsite are business property, and homeowners policies exclude or severely limit business property away from the home.

For a tradesperson whose tools represent thousands of dollars and whose ability to work depends on them, that is a meaningful gap. Contractors equipment coverage, written on an inland marine form, covers tools in transit, at jobsites, and in storage.

Tool theft from trucks is persistent throughout South Florida, and it happens overnight in places people assume are safe.

What Contractors Actually Ask For

A certificate is not one thing. Contracts commonly specify several separate items, and a certificate showing adequate limits can still fail if one is missing:

Limits at a specified amount for general liability. Workers’ compensation, or documented proof of exemption where accepted. Additional insured status naming the contractor, sometimes covering both ongoing and completed operations. Waiver of subrogation, preventing your insurer from pursuing them. Primary and non-contributory wording, making your policy respond first.

Each of those is a separate endorsement on your policy. Getting the contract requirements to your agent before you sign prevents the delay of scrambling for endorsements while a job waits.

Know Where Your Scope Ends

Florida licenses electrical, plumbing, HVAC, roofing, and structural work. Working outside your license is a regulatory problem, and it can also give an insurer reason to question a claim arising from that work.

This matters for tradespeople who take on adjacent work because a customer asked. The bathroom job that needs a supply line moved. The repair that turns structural once the wall is open. The favor that involves a panel.

Describe your operations accurately when you get quoted, including anything you occasionally do. Coverage is priced on what you actually perform, and work that was never disclosed is the kind of thing that surfaces at claim time.

If your work spans several small trades rather than one specialty, our handyman insurance page covers that profile specifically.

When You Start Hiring

The transition from working alone to having help changes your obligations immediately.

Hiring employees triggers workers’ compensation requirements. Paying helpers as 1099s who function as employees creates classification exposure with tax and wage consequences beyond insurance. And your own general liability rates are based on payroll, which means your audit changes.

Telling your agent before you hire rather than after is the difference between a planned change and an audit surprise.

Talk It Through Before the Next Job

Prestige Insurance Group works with 1099 tradespeople and subcontractors throughout Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach County, Orlando, Tampa, the Treasure Coast, and across Florida — in carpentry, flooring, drywall, cabinets, HVAC, electrical, handyman work, and the trades generally.

If a contractor has asked you for a certificate, bring the requirement itself rather than a summary. What it specifies determines what has to be issued.

Miami: 305-969-8776 Orlando: 407-993-2331 Stuart: 561-983-4333

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Related Articles

Contractor Insurance in Florida · Handyman Insurance · Do Contractors Need Workers’ Comp in Florida? · What Contractor Insurance Does Not Cover in Florida · General Liability Insurance · Business Auto Insurance

This article describes general insurance concepts and Florida statutory provisions as of publication. It is not legal advice. Workers’ compensation exemption eligibility and licensing requirements are fact-specific — confirm your status with your agent and the applicable state agency.