Insurance for Moving Companies
A household move puts your truck on the road, your crew on someone’s stairs and a family’s belongings in your hands, and California sets insurance minimums for all three. We look for business insurance for moving companies that fits the BHGS permit and the buildings you load at, and the insurer decides after reviewing your trucks, crew and claim history.
Business insurance for moving companies starts with the BHGS permit
A business that moves household goods within California, including moves that start or end out of state, needs a permit from the Bureau of Household Goods and Services. The Household Movers Act sets the liability insurance a permit holder must carry in Business and Professions Code 19248: $250,000 for bodily injury or death to one person, $500,000 for bodily injury per accident, $100,000 per accident for damage to property other than the goods being moved, and $600,000 combined single limit per accident. The Bureau can raise those figures.
The same section requires $20,000 of cargo insurance for the life of the permit, which the Bureau may lower on a showing. Section 19239.1 adds a current certificate of workers’ compensation insurance in the business name, filed with the Bureau before it issues or renews a permit. The state enforces these rules in the field: in a sweep announced in December 2025, the Bureau checked 40 movers across Alameda, Los Angeles, Orange, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties, looking for unlicensed operators and missing workers’ comp.
The truck: commercial auto for household moves
Auto liability limits that meet the $600,000 combined figure in section 19248 are the starting point for a household mover, and contracts can ask for more. Commercial auto covers injury and property damage your drivers cause on the way to and from a move, and in Insureon’s published data for moving companies it is the largest premium line.
List every truck, its gross weight and every crew member who drives, including a seasonal helper who only takes the wheel in summer. This page covers household moving; freight and for-hire trucking fall outside it, so tell us at the start if part of your revenue comes from hauling.
Customer belongings: cargo cover and Max 4 valuation
The Bureau’s Maximum Rate Tariff 4, in its edition effective January 1, 2023, sets how your liability for a customer’s goods is valued. The base rates assume a declared value of $0.60 per pound per article. Its consumer notice gives the example: a 20-pound item lost or damaged under that basic coverage pays $12.00. If the customer declares no value at all, your liability defaults to actual cash value up to $20,000.
Customers can buy more. The tariff caps the charge for actual cash value at $1.06 per $100 of declared value, and for full value protection, where you replace, pay replacement cost or repair, at $2.04 per $100, or $0.64 with a $250 customer deductible and $0.36 with a $500 deductible. Leave the valuation rates off the agreement and the charge defaults to $0. Full value promises must be backed by insurance under the PUC General Order 136 series unless the Bureau approves an alternative, so your cargo or inland marine policy should match the protection you sell, including goods held in storage in transit, which the tariff rates separately.
Damage claims and the tariff’s response clock
Max 4 gives a customer 9 months from delivery to file a written loss or damage claim, and 2 years and 1 day after your written disallowance to sue. You must acknowledge a claim in writing within 30 days and pay, decline or make a firm offer within 60. If you cannot, you send a status letter every 30 days, with a copy to the Bureau.
Those deadlines run whether or not your insurer has finished its review, so report a damaged armoire to your cargo carrier the day the customer calls, with photos, the inventory sheet and the signed agreement. A claim file that starts on time is the easiest way to meet the 60-day reply.
Mover certificate of insurance requests from buildings
Office towers and apartment buildings set their own rules for move day, and a certificate is the price of using the loading dock. One office building’s published move policy, for example, required movers to file a certificate showing at least $2,000,000 of general liability, workers’ comp and commercial auto, plus a separate additional insured endorsement naming the owner, the asset manager and the property manager. It limited moves to after business hours, required protection for floors and elevator cabs, and billed the tenant for any service call the move caused.
Certificates get turned away for limits under the building’s minimum, policy dates that miss the move date, or a missing additional insured endorsement. Send us the building’s requirements a week ahead so the certificate carries the right names. When a building wants $2 million and your general liability stops at $1 million per occurrence, a commercial umbrella closes the gap. Our certificate of insurance guide shows how to read one.
General liability for elevators, door frames and lobbies
Most move-day damage claims involve the building, not the truck or the cargo: a gouged elevator cab, a cracked door frame, scraped hardwood in a common hallway. General liability responds to that damage and to injuries to people who are not your employees, such as a customer who trips over equipment on moving day, an example Insureon uses for this trade.
Whatever the permit asks for, a building owner or property manager reads the general liability limits on your certificate, so the building’s request and this policy have to line up.
Crew injuries and the workers’ comp filing
Lifting is the work, and back and shoulder strains follow. Insureon’s own example for movers is an employee who hurts their back lifting a dresser. Workers’ compensation pays the medical bills and lost wages, and for a mover it is also a permit condition: the Bureau keeps your certificate on file, insurers report policy details and cancellations to it, and a cancellation takes 30 days’ notice.
A mover with no employees files a statement under penalty of perjury instead. That option ends with the first paid helper, even one who only works busy weekends, unless the helper is truly an independent business; our page on employees and independent contractors in California explains the test. Labor Code 3700.5 treats operating without coverage as a misdemeanor, with up to a year in county jail and a fine of at least $10,000, up to double the missed premium.
What moving company insurance costs
Insureon’s figures for moving companies, updated in June 2025, come from its own small-business customers and are national medians, not California market prices or a Mithril1 quote. It reports about $876 a month ($10,512 a year) for commercial auto, $120 a month ($1,440 a year) for general liability on a sample $1 million per occurrence and $2 million aggregate policy with a $625 deductible, and $755 a month ($9,058 a year) for workers’ compensation. It publishes no cargo or umbrella figures. These numbers reflect small operators at standard limits; larger movers pay well above them.
Auto is priced on trucks, their weight and radius, and each driver’s record. Workers’ comp is priced on crew payroll. Added together, Insureon’s three medians come to about $21,010 a year for a small mover before cargo, umbrella or storage coverage.
Premiums rise with more or heavier trucks, longer-distance moves, drivers with tickets, larger crews, building contracts that call for $2 million or more, and past cargo or injury claims. They fall with clean motor vehicle records, written lifting and loading procedures, inventory sheets signed at pickup and delivery, and a short claim history. The insurer sets the rate after its review.
A few useful answers
Common questions
What business insurance for moving companies does the BHGS permit require?
Liability of $250,000 per person and $500,000 per accident for bodily injury, $100,000 per accident for property damage and $600,000 combined single limit (B&P 19248), $20,000 of cargo insurance, and a workers’ comp certificate on file with the Bureau, or a no-employee statement.
What is the difference between 60-cent coverage and full value protection?
Basic coverage under Max 4 pays $0.60 per pound per article, so a 20-pound item pays $12.00. Full value protection obliges the mover to replace, pay replacement cost or repair, and it must be backed by insurance.
How long does a customer have to file a moving damage claim?
Nine months from delivery, in writing. The mover then has 30 days to acknowledge the claim and 60 days to pay, decline or make a firm offer, with status letters every 30 days if it needs longer.
Why does a building ask for $2 million on a mover certificate of insurance?
The state figures are a floor for the permit; a building owner sets its own limits to protect its lobby, elevators and tenants. An umbrella over general liability is the usual way to reach a higher building requirement.
Can a new moving company get coverage through Mithril1 before its first move?
It can, when an insurer accepts the application after reviewing your trucks, drivers, crew size and permit status. We request each line the permit and your first buildings call for, so the certificates are ready before move day.