Insurance by operating model
How a job shop and a product manufacturer are insured
Machine shops, fabricators, and manufacturers are not one class to an underwriter. Working to a customer’s print and making and selling your own product sit at two ends of one axis, and metal fabrication and welding shops, which also work to a drawing, add hot work and the work they install. Each carries a different lead exposure and a different coverage stack. Here is how the three differ.
The models share lines — a job shop, a fabricator, and a manufacturer all carry general liability, property, machine and equipment, and workers compensation — but the emphasis and the order differ. A machine shop works to someone else’s specification, so the equipment that does the work is the asset to protect (equipment breakdown leads) and the precision is the exposure (an out-of-spec part runs to errors and omissions; a defective part runs to products liability). A manufacturer makes and sells its own product, so the product going into the world is the defining exposure (products liability leads), along with the recall that pulls it back and the federal sector regulation it carries. A metal fabrication or welding shop works to a drawing too, but hot work and the work it installs put fire and completed operations at the front. Writing all three off one generic form misprices some and leaves the rest exposed.
Machine Shop Insurance
Lead exposure: the equipment that runs the floor and the work made to a customer’s print
Insurance for machine shops — CNC machining, laser cutting, job shops, contract machining, and tool and die work. The precision-machining operating model, where working to spec on customers’ parts, machine-heavy production, and the per-job contract drive the risk profile.
See the coverage by model →Manufacturing Insurance
Lead exposure: products liability, product recall, and the federal regulation a product carries
Insurance for manufacturers — metal, plastic, food, auto-parts, beverage, aerospace, firearm, medical-device, and metal rolling and forming. The product-manufacturer operating model, where making and selling your own products drives the products-liability, recall, and industry-regulatory exposure.
See the coverage by model →Metal Fabrication Shop Insurance
Lead exposure: hot work and fire, and the completed operations on work you install
Insurance for metal fabrication and welding shops — structural steel, miscellaneous and ornamental metals, sheet metal, custom fabrication, and mobile welders. Hot work, field-installed work, and equipment that travels to the job drive this risk profile.
See the coverage by model →Not sure which model you are?
Many operations carry elements of both — a job shop that also makes a product line of its own, or a manufacturer with an in-house machine shop. Start a quote and we will sort out which model — or which mix — your operation really is, or browse the coverage lines the class carries and the states we serve on the locations index.
Primary sources
Insure your operation the way it runs
Tell us whether you machine to a print, sell your own product, or both — and we will market it to carriers that write the class.