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Commercial Insurance · Product Capability

Primary Casualty (General Liability) Insurance

Not every GL policy responds the same way when a claim lands. Simpson | McCrady structures primary casualty coverage around your actual exposure profile, not a standard form pulled off a shelf.

Why This Requires Expertise

General Liability Is Deceptively Complex, and the Gaps Are Where Businesses Get Hurt

What makes general liability insurance complex for middle-market businesses? On the surface, the answer sounds manageable: bodily injury, property damage, personal and advertising injury arising from your operations. In practice, the coverage that actually responds when a claim happens depends on decisions made long before the incident: whether your policy is written on an occurrence or claims-made form, how your additional insured endorsement architecture is structured, where your umbrella attaches and what gaps exist between layers, and which industry-specific exclusions your carrier has embedded in the manuscript form.

For privately-owned businesses with premiums in the $50,000–$250,000 range, these aren't abstract distinctions. An occurrence vs. claims-made structure determines whether a claim filed years after a completed project is covered at all. A poorly drafted additional insured endorsement can leave a general contractor exposed on a loss they believed was fully tendered. Products and completed operations coverage that looks adequate on the declaration page may carry sublimits or exclusions that collapse under a real product liability event.

Simpson | McCrady's casualty specialists have placed GL programs across manufacturing, real estate, technology, professional services, and contracting throughout Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania for more than 100 years. We know where the coverage gaps hide: in the policy language, in the carrier's endorsement library, and in the interaction between your primary casualty layer and the umbrella sitting above it. That knowledge is what separates a policy that pays from one that disappoints at the worst possible moment.

Break Down the Coverages →

What We Cover

What Primary Casualty (General Liability) Insurance Covers

What This Coverage Includes

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Bodily Injury & Property Damage Liability

Core coverage for third-party claims arising from your premises, operations, and the actions of your employees — structured around how your business actually creates exposure, not how a standard form assumes it does.

Products & Completed Operations Coverage

Liability protection for bodily injury or property damage that occurs after your product leaves your hands or your work is finished — a critical coverage line for manufacturers, contractors, and distributors where claims routinely emerge years post-completion.

Contractual Liability Insurance

Coverage for liability assumed under an insured contract — protecting your business when agreements with clients, landlords, or upstream contractors require you to indemnify another party for losses arising from your operations.

Personal & Advertising Injury Coverage

Protection against claims of libel, slander, copyright infringement, wrongful eviction, and similar offenses arising from your business communications, marketing materials, and advertising activities.

Premises & Operations Liability

Liability arising from the physical condition of your premises and the conduct of ongoing operations — including incidents involving visitors, vendors, and third parties at your location or job sites.

Occurrence Form General Liability

Coverage written on an occurrence basis, meaning claims are covered by the policy in force at the time of the incident — regardless of when the claim is actually filed. Critical for businesses with long-tail exposure or multi-year project work.

Claims-Made GL Policy Structuring

For businesses where a claims-made form is the market standard, we review retroactive dates, extended reporting periods, and tail coverage options to ensure no gap exists between policy periods — a nuance transactional brokers routinely overlook.

Additional Insured Endorsement Architecture

Structuring additional insured status for upstream clients, landlords, lenders, and project owners — reviewed at the endorsement level, not just the certificate level, to confirm the coverage granted matches the contractual obligation assumed.

Medical Payments Coverage

First-party medical expense coverage for injuries sustained by third parties on your premises, paid regardless of fault — often a cost-effective tool for resolving minor incidents before they escalate to liability claims.

Umbrella & Excess Liability Interaction

We review how your primary casualty layer interacts with your umbrella and excess liability program — identifying attachment points, underlying schedule alignment, and drop-down triggers so your total liability tower performs as a unified structure.

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Not Sure Your Current Coverage Goes Far Enough?

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Our Approach

The Difference Between a Policy That Pays and One That Disappoints

As an independent commercial insurance broker in Pittsburgh, Simpson | McCrady is not tied to any single carrier's product or appetite. When we place a general liability program, we begin by mapping your actual exposure profile: your operations, your contracts, your industry-specific risk concentrations, and the regulatory environment in which you operate across Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic region. That assessment drives every placement decision that follows.

From there, we submit your risk to multiple carriers, negotiate coverage terms at the form and endorsement level, not just the premium level, and review final policy language before binding. We are looking for the exclusions the standard quote doesn't surface, the sublimits that create false confidence, and the endorsements that quietly erode what the declaration page appears to provide. This is work that a volume desk at a national firm does not do, because it requires time, direct carrier relationships, and a specialist's command of how GL programs perform under real claim conditions.

Once your program is bound, our advocacy continues. We manage certificates, track additional insured obligations, and engage directly with carriers when claims arise, because the moment a loss is reported is not the moment to be reading your policy language for the first time. Simpson | McCrady's casualty specialists have managed GL programs through hard markets, carrier withdrawals, and complex multi-party claims. That experience, built over more than 100 years of practice in Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania, is the resource our clients are actually buying when they choose to work with us.

Discuss Your Limits →

Firm Credentials

The Depth Behind Your Coverage

100+
Years in Business
$20B+
In Insured Assets
5,000+
Clients Served
1911
Independent Since
Pittsburgh, PA bridge

Speak With an Advisor

Speak with a Trusted Advisor

One straightforward conversation is all it takes to understand where your coverage stands, and where it should be. Protecting Tomorrow Today.

Prefer to call? 412-261-2222
info@simpson-mccrady.com

Prefer to talk? 412-261-2222

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