Additional insured (vendors / contracts)

When a vendor works on association property, a landscaper, a roofer, a pool service, a management company, the association wants to be named as an additional insured on that vendor's liability policy, so a claim arising from the vendor's work is defended and paid by the vendor's insurer rather than the association's. Many recorded CC&Rs and management agreements require the board to obtain this, and it is confirmed through a certificate of insurance (COI) plus the actual additional insured endorsement. There is no statute setting the terms here; this is contract and certificate-of-insurance practice, so the governing documents and the vendor contract control what the board is entitled to require. The COI alone is not proof of coverage; it is a snapshot that references the underlying endorsement, and only the endorsement form and policy language decide whether the association is truly covered and on what basis.

This is the association's cheapest and most overlooked layer of liability protection, and it fails quietly. A board collects a certificate at contract signing, files it, and never confirms the additional insured endorsement actually exists, that the coverage is primary and non-contributory rather than sharing with the association's own policy, or that the certificate is still in force when a claim hits months later. When a vendor injures someone or damages property, an association that never secured proper additional insured status defends the claim on its own general liability policy and takes the loss experience, driving its own renewal. Build a simple COI intake routine: require the additional insured endorsement (not just the certificate) before work starts, confirm primary and non-contributory language and a waiver of subrogation, check that the vendor's own limits are adequate for the exposure (commonly a $1M per-occurrence general liability floor, higher for roofing, structural, or amenity work), and re-collect certificates at every renewal so coverage never lapses mid-contract. Read what the CC&Rs and any management or vendor agreement actually require, then hold vendors to it rather than accepting whatever certificate they hand over.

Additional insured status on a vendor's policy costs the association nothing and shifts the vendor's own exposure back onto the vendor's insurer, which is exactly where it belongs. The recurring failure is procedural, not a pricing decision: boards accept a certificate of insurance as if it were coverage. Insist on the endorsement form itself, primary and non-contributory wording, and a waiver of subrogation, and treat certificate collection as a standing renewal task rather than a one-time signing formality.