12.5 Commercial Auto Endorsements

Drive Other Car (DOC) — CA 99 10

A business owns its vehicles on a BAP, but an executive who has no Personal Auto Policy of their own has a gap: when that person drives a friend's car or rents on vacation, the BAP normally covers only the named insured (a corporation) and not the individual personally.

Drive Other Car (DOC) coverage extends the BAP to specified individuals and their family members, treating them as covered drivers of non-owned autos much like a PAP would. It typically adds liability, medical payments, and uninsured/underinsured motorists for those named individuals.

Trap: DOC is for people who do NOT have their own personal auto policy. An employee who already carries a PAP does not need DOC — their PAP follows them into non-owned autos.

Hired and Non-Owned Auto Endorsements

Two exposures recur in nearly every commercial account:

• Hired Auto Liability (Symbol 8) — liability arising from autos the business rents, leases, or borrows.
• Employers Non-Ownership Liability (Symbol 9, often via CA 99 54) — liability when employees use their own cars on company business. The employer can be sued even though it owns nothing.

Worked example

An employee runs a company errand in their personal car and causes a $200,000 injury. The employee's PAP pays first up to its $100,000 limit. The employer's non-owned auto coverage responds excess for the remaining $100,000, protecting the company from vicarious liability. Hired and non-owned coverage is inexpensive because there is no owned physical-damage exposure — only liability.

Lessor, Loss Payee, Rental Reimbursement, and Pollution

Lessor — Additional Insured and Loss Payee (CA 20 01)

When a business leases a vehicle, the lessor wants protection. This endorsement names the lessor as an additional insured for liability and a loss payee for physical damage, and can void certain exclusions affecting the lessor's interest.

Loss Payable / Lienholder

A financed auto's lender is added as a loss payee so physical-damage payments protect the lien. Like a mortgagee clause, the lender's interest can survive certain acts of the insured.

Rental Reimbursement and Towing

• Rental Reimbursement (CA 99 23) — pays a daily amount (e.g., $50/day up to $1,500) for a substitute vehicle while a covered auto is repaired after a covered physical-damage loss.
• Towing and Labor — per-disablement cap (often $75), available only where Comprehensive or Collision applies.

Pollution and Mobile Equipment

The base form sharply limits pollution liability. Broadened Pollution Coverage for Covered Autos (CA 99 48) restores some pollution liability tied to a covered auto. Mobile-equipment endorsements address equipment that is sometimes an "auto" and sometimes excluded "mobile equipment" under the CGL/BAP boundary.

Audit Frame: Auto-Specific Endorsements

The Business Auto Coverage Form is routinely tailored with ISO endorsements, and the exam tests which one solves a given fact pattern. Memorize the form numbers and triggers:

Quick Answer: When an executive with a company car has no personal auto policy, the answer is Drive Other Car (CA 99 10) plus broadened coverage.

Worked Example: The Company-Car Executive

A company furnishes a vehicle to its CFO, who has cancelled her personal auto policy because she no longer owns a personal car. One weekend she borrows a neighbor's car and causes an at-fault accident. The Business Auto policy's liability covers owned autos and certain hired/non-owned exposures of the named insured organization — but it does not automatically follow the CFO into a borrowed private-passenger vehicle as a personal policy would.

The Drive Other Car — Broadened Coverage (CA 99 10) endorsement fixes this. It lists the CFO by name and extends liability, medical payments, uninsured-motorist, and physical-damage coverage to her when she drives autos she does not own. Without it, she has a serious personal coverage gap. Trap: the BAP alone is not a substitute for a personal auto policy for the individual driver.

Hired and Non-Owned Auto Exposures

Two of the most-tested commercial-auto gaps involve vehicles the business does not own. Hired auto coverage applies to autos the business rents, leases, or borrows (symbol 8); liability is usually included when symbol 8 is shown, but hired-auto physical damage (CA 99 23) must be added separately to cover damage to the rented vehicle itself. Non-owned auto coverage (symbol 9) responds when employees use their own cars on company business — protecting the employer from vicarious liability for an employee's at-fault accident while running a work errand.

Worked example: an employee uses her personal car to deliver documents for the employer and causes an accident. The injured party sues the employer under respondeat superior. The employer's non-owned auto liability (symbol 9) responds; without it, the employer is exposed even though it owns no vehicle involved. Trap: non-owned coverage protects the employer's vicarious liability — it is not physical-damage coverage for the employee's car.