Subcontractor Insurance Requirements in Florida: What GCs Should Require on Every COI

At a minimum, most Florida general contractors should require every subcontractor to carry general liability, workers' compensation, and commercial auto insurance — and, on larger or higher-risk scopes, an umbrella/excess policy. Just as important are the two endorsements that protect the GC directly: additional insured status and a waiver of subrogation. The specific coverages and limits are set by your contract and your risk, not by a single statute, so treat the figures below as typical baselines to confirm with your insurance agent or attorney.

A subcontractor's certificate of insurance is only useful if you know what you are looking for. A clean-looking ACORD 25 can still be missing the one endorsement that would have protected you, or it can carry limits that fall short of what your own prime contract requires. This guide walks through the coverages a Florida GC should require from every sub, why each one matters, and how to read the certificate so the protection you negotiated for actually holds up.

Why a GC should require coverage from every sub

When you hire a subcontractor, their work becomes your problem if something goes wrong. A property-damage claim, an injured worker, a vehicle accident on the way to the site — any of these can land on the general contractor, the owner, or the project itself. Requiring the sub to carry adequate insurance, and to extend the right pieces of it to you, is how you keep the sub's risk where it belongs: with the sub.

Florida does not set a single, universal "subcontractor must carry X" rule that covers every coverage line. Instead, requirements come from a mix of state law (workers' compensation rules are the strict, statutory exception), your prime contract and the owner's requirements, and your own assessment of how risky the scope is. That is why the limits in this article are framed as what many GCs require — common, defensible baselines — rather than legal minimums.

Coverage requirements are set by contract and risk, not by one statute. Use typical baselines as a starting point, then confirm the actual limits and endorsements with your insurance agent or attorney for your specific project.

The coverages to require and typical baseline limits

Here is a quick reference for the core coverages many Florida GCs require from subs, with commonly used baseline limits. Treat the numbers as a starting point to confirm against your own contract and your agent's advice — not as legal minimums.

General liability: the foundation

Commercial general liability (CGL) is the coverage that responds when the sub's work causes third-party bodily injury or property damage — a falling tool, water damage, a finished installation that fails and harms someone. It is the first coverage you should confirm on every COI.

A widely used baseline is $1,000,000 per occurrence with a $2,000,000 aggregate. The per-occurrence limit caps what the policy pays for any single claim; the aggregate caps the total it will pay across the policy period. Both numbers matter, because a sub who has already burned through most of an aggregate on prior claims may have far less coverage left than the certificate suggests at first glance. These figures are common, not mandatory — larger projects, or your own prime contract, may demand higher limits.

Workers' compensation: Florida construction rules are strict

Workers' compensation is the one coverage line where Florida law is genuinely strict for construction. The thresholds that trigger required coverage are much lower for the construction industry than for other industries, which means a small construction sub is far more likely to be required to carry it than a small business in another field.

This is also where GCs get burned by "exemptions." A sub may tell you they are exempt — but an exemption is specific, applies only to named corporate officers, and does not cover a sub's employees. If a sub claims exemption, they should be able to produce a valid exemption certificate, and you should confirm it rather than take it on faith. Because the rules are nuanced and the stakes are high, this coverage deserves its own deeper read. See our guide to Florida workers' comp requirements for construction subcontractors for the details.

Commercial auto liability

Subs drive to and from your site, haul materials, and move equipment — and an at-fault accident in a company vehicle can generate serious liability. Commercial auto liability covers bodily injury and property damage arising from the sub's vehicles. A common baseline GCs require is a $1,000,000 combined single limit, which covers bodily injury and property damage under one shared limit rather than splitting them.

Pay attention to whether the policy covers any auto, owned autos, or hired and non-owned autos — the ACORD 25 has checkboxes for each. A sub whose crew uses personal trucks for the job may need hired-and-non-owned coverage for the protection to actually apply.

Umbrella / excess liability

An umbrella or excess policy sits on top of the general liability and auto policies and adds limits once the underlying coverage is exhausted. On larger projects or higher-risk scopes, a $1M general liability limit can be inadequate, and an umbrella is how subs reach the higher totals a GC or owner requires — often $1M to $5M or more, scaled to the size and risk of the work.

Umbrella coverage is not always required of every sub, but it is worth requiring from the ones doing the most dangerous or most expensive work. When you do require it, confirm the underlying policies it sits above actually match the ones on the certificate.

The two endorsements that actually protect the GC

Here is the part that catches GCs off guard: simply requiring a sub to carry insurance does not, by itself, give you any rights under that insurance. Two endorsements are what extend the sub's coverage to protect the general contractor — and both must be added to the sub's underlying policy, not just mentioned on the certificate.

Additional insured

Being named as an additional insured on the sub's general liability policy means that if you are pulled into a claim arising from the sub's work, you can tap the sub's coverage rather than your own. Without this endorsement, the sub's policy protects the sub — not you — even though the work was theirs.

Waiver of subrogation

A waiver of subrogation stops the sub's insurer from paying a claim and then turning around to recover that money from you. Without it, an insurer that pays out on a loss can later pursue the GC to claw the payment back — undoing much of the protection you thought you had.

Together, these two endorsements are what actually shift risk down to the party doing the work. Confirm both are in place — and that the certificate reflects them — before the sub starts. For a fuller breakdown of how they differ and why you generally want both, see additional insured vs. waiver of subrogation.

How to read the ACORD 25 certificate

The ACORD 25 Certificate of Liability Insurance is the standard form a sub's agent issues to summarize their active policies. It is a snapshot, not the policy itself — but read correctly, it tells you most of what you need. Work through it in this order:

1. Confirm each coverage line is present. General liability, workers' comp, auto, and (where required) umbrella should each appear with a check and a policy number.
2. Match the limits to your own requirements. Read the per-occurrence and aggregate figures and compare them against what your prime contract or the owner obligates you to carry. Coverage that exists but falls short still leaves you exposed.
3. Confirm you are named as additional insured. Look in the description box and check whether the certificate states the GC is an additional insured — and remember the certificate alone does not grant it; the underlying endorsement must exist.
4. Look for the waiver of subrogation. It is often noted in the same description area. Its absence is easy to miss and expensive to discover later.
5. Watch the effective and expiration dates. Each policy line has its own dates. A policy that expires mid-project, or one whose effective date starts after the sub is already on site, is a gap you want to catch now.

Reading one certificate correctly is straightforward once you know the layout. For a field-by-field walkthrough — including the boxes that quietly hide the most important details — see our guide on how to read an ACORD 25 certificate of insurance.

How SubShield helps

Checking one certificate is easy. Checking dozens — across every sub, every project, and every renewal — and remembering exactly which limits and endorsements you require is where it breaks down. That is the problem SubShield is built to solve.

• AI reads each subcontractor's ACORD 25 certificate of insurance and extracts the coverage types, per-occurrence and aggregate limits, policy numbers, and dates automatically.
• It checks the limits against your requirements so you know at a glance whether a sub meets the coverage your contract obligates you to carry.
• It flags missing endorsements — including additional insured and waiver of subrogation — so the protection you negotiated for does not quietly fall off the certificate.
• It sends expiration alerts before a policy lapses, so coverage never goes stale mid-project without anyone noticing.

You can try the COI reader to see it work on a real certificate, or create an account to start tracking your subs' insurance and licenses in one dashboard.