The tools were taken off the truck overnight. Which policy answers depends on where the truck was.
Contractors usually assume one policy covers their gear wherever it happens to be. It does not. Tools on a site, tools in a van, materials waiting to be installed and a machine you rented for a fortnight are four different covers, and a business can hold three of them and be missing the one that matters.
Start a quote file Read the short answer firstA shop policy stops at the shop.
The van is insured. The contents are not.
How it was secured is part of the cover.
Are my tools covered if they are stolen from my truck or off a job site?
Only if you carry a contractor’s equipment floater, and even then only within the conditions written into it. A commercial property policy insures property at the location described on the declarations page, so it stops at your shop or yard. An automobile policy insures the vehicle, not the tools inside it. The cover that follows your equipment around, from the yard to the van to the site and back, is a separate item that has to be bought on purpose.
This is the single most common gap on a small contractor’s policy, and it stays hidden because nothing about a general liability certificate mentions it. Liability answers what you do to other people. It has never covered your own tools. A contractor can be perfectly compliant with every certificate a general asks for and still have nothing at all on the gear in the back of the van.
Northbridge Insurance, writing about equipment theft on Canadian job sites, puts it plainly: recovery rates for stolen equipment are not high. Serial numbers and photographs help police and help a claim, but the realistic outcome of a theft is a claim rather than a return. That is worth knowing before you decide whether the cover is worth the premium, because the question is not whether you will get the machine back. It is whether you can buy another one and keep the job moving while you do. Northbridge sets out the layered security measures insurers look for, and those same measures turn up as conditions inside the policies.
Which one answers depends on what the item is doing at the time.
Contractor’s equipment floater
Your own tools and machines, wherever they are. Larger items are usually scheduled by serial number, and small tools are covered as a blanket amount with a per-item cap. Read the per-item cap. A blanket figure that looks generous can still settle a stolen laser level or a specialist torque tool at a fraction of what it cost.
Installation floater
Materials you have bought and are going to install, while they are in transit, in storage and on site before the job is accepted. These are not your tools and they are not the building owner’s property yet, which is exactly why they fall between two policies. On fit-out and mechanical work this is often the biggest single exposure on the job.
Builders risk on the project
Covers the work under construction. It usually does not cover the contractor’s own tools and equipment, and it frequently excludes them by name. Being on a project with a builders risk policy in place is not a reason to drop your own floater, though it is a common assumption on site.
Rented and borrowed equipment
The rental agreement makes you responsible for the machine, often for its full replacement value and for the rental company’s lost rental income while it is off the fleet. Your floater covers equipment you own unless it has been extended to equipment in your care. Send the rental agreement rather than guessing, because the wording differs between rental companies.
Three files where the theft was never really the problem.
The condition nobody read
Equipment floaters commonly carry conditions about how items are secured overnight, where a vehicle is parked, and whether an alarm or immobiliser is fitted and switched on. These are not suggestions. A theft from a van left on the street when the policy required a locked compound is a declined claim on a policy that was otherwise perfectly good.
The list that was never updated
Scheduled equipment is covered as scheduled. A machine bought in March and never added is not on the schedule in November. Most policies carry a newly acquired equipment extension that covers new purchases for a limited period, which exists precisely so you can add them, not so you can skip adding them. Diarise it or the extension expires quietly.
The employee, not the stranger
Property taken by your own staff is generally excluded from an equipment floater, because dishonesty by employees is a different risk and sits under crime or fidelity cover. Contractors discover this at the worst possible moment, having already worked out who did it. If your tools move through a lot of hands, the crime section is the one to ask about.
The ones that come up the morning the van is empty.
Does my commercial auto policy cover the tools in the van?
No. Automobile insurance covers the vehicle and your liability for using it. The contents are property, and property in a vehicle is covered by an equipment floater, not by the auto policy. The two are frequently confused because both involve the same van, which is why this gap survives for years.
Is it worth insuring hand tools, or only the big machines?
Work out what a full van would cost to replace in one go, at today’s prices, and then ask whether you could buy that lot again next week and still keep the crew working. Most contractors find the number is larger than they expect, because it accumulated a few hundred dollars at a time over several years and was never added up.
The general contractor’s builders risk is in place. Am I covered?
For the work, probably. For your own tools and equipment, usually not, and often expressly not. Builders risk covers the project. Your gear is yours, it leaves the site every night, and it needs its own cover. This is the same distinction that catches trades out on wrap-up liability.
What does the insurer want to see after a theft?
A police file number, a list with makes, models and serial numbers, purchase records or photographs, and an account of how the items were secured. The list is the part contractors do not have, and it is the part that decides how quickly a claim settles. Photograph the van interior and the schedule once a year and keep it off the truck.
Will fitting trackers and immobilisers reduce the premium?
Sometimes, and more importantly it changes what an insurer is willing to write at all on a fleet with a claims history. Security measures also tend to appear as conditions after a claim, so fitting them before is both cheaper and voluntary. Tell your broker what is already fitted, because it is rarely asked about on a standard application.
Not the question you had? Send your equipment list and your current policy through the quote file and you will get a written answer, not a sales call.
Find out what is actually on your policy before the van is empty.
Send the declarations page and a rough equipment list. You will get a written note on what is covered, what the per-item cap is, and what the conditions require of you.