Garage Liability

Designed to help address claims arising from an incident on your premises that results in injury or property damage to a customer or visitor — a slip in the waiting area, a customer struck by a vehicle in the lot.

This is typically the coverage a landlord requires, and it is generally what a standard garage liability policy provides. It is a necessary foundation. It is also, on its own, an incomplete picture of a repair shop’s exposure.

Garagekeepers Legal Liability

This coverage responds to customer vehicles in your care, custody, and control.

A vehicle is left overnight and is stolen. A tree comes down on a car in the side lot. A fire starts in the shop. Hail moves through and damages a lot full of vehicles waiting on parts. Garage liability alone generally will not respond to those vehicles — garagekeepers is the coverage written for them.

Two questions help determine whether a limit is adequate:

• How many customer vehicles are on your property on a typical night?
• What is the average value of those vehicles?

Consider the total, then compare it to your current garagekeepers limit. Florida shops in particular may want to think in terms of a full lot rather than an average one — named storms, hail, and flooding tend to affect vehicles in groups rather than one at a time. Coverage for specific perils varies by policy and insurer.

Garage Operations and Completed Work

A technician rebuilds a transmission and something goes wrong. The unit is ruined, or the vehicle fails on the road a week later.

That is a claim arising from your work rather than from an incident on your premises, and standard liability forms commonly exclude it. Coverage for faulty work and completed operations is what may respond. For shops performing mechanical repair, this is among the more consequential coverages to review — and it is generally not included by default.

If your current policy has never been reviewed for garagekeepers limits or completed-work coverage, that is a worthwhile conversation to have.

Non-Owned and Hired Auto

Designed to help address claims when employees operate vehicles your business does not own — test drives, moving cars around the lot, running a customer’s vehicle to another shop.

If a technician is at fault in a collision during a test drive, non-owned auto coverage is generally what responds to injury and damage caused to the other party. Damage to the customer’s vehicle itself would typically fall under garagekeepers. Shop owners are often surprised by that distinction, and both are worth confirming.

Workers’ Compensation

Lifts, compressed air, solvents, hot exhaust, heavy components, and long days on concrete. Repair work produces real injuries, and strains and hand injuries generate claims at a rate many owners do not anticipate.

Workers’ compensation helps provide medical benefits and wage replacement when an employee is injured on the job. Florida generally requires it for non-construction employers at four or more employees, including part-time; construction thresholds differ. It also helps protect the business — without coverage, an injured employee’s recourse may become a direct claim against you.

Learn more about Workers’ Compensation →

Commercial Property and Equipment

Lifts, diagnostic equipment, alignment racks, paint booths, compressors, and tool inventory. Property coverage is designed to help address losses from fire, theft, vandalism, and certain covered weather events.

Two additions worth pricing alongside it:

• Business income — designed to help replace revenue while you are closed following a covered loss. Three weeks of repairs after a fire can mean three weeks of payroll and rent with no vehicles moving through the bays.
• Equipment breakdown — addresses mechanical and electrical failure of equipment you cannot operate without. When a paint booth or compressor goes down, a property policy alone generally will not respond.

Learn more about Commercial Property Insurance →

Commercial Auto

Covers vehicles titled to the business — tow trucks, parts runners, mobile service vans, and loaner vehicles. Personal auto policies generally exclude business use, so shops operating loaner fleets or mobile services should have this addressed directly.

Learn more about Commercial Auto Insurance →

Comegys Insurance has served Florida businesses from St. Petersburg since 1939 — family-owned, third-generation, and independent for more than 85 years.

Independence matters here. A captive agent represents one company’s products. Because we work with a wide range of carriers writing business in Florida, we can compare how different insurers structure garage coverage rather than fitting your shop to a single available form.

We start with how your shop actually operates — what you work on, how many vehicles stay overnight, what is stored inside versus outside, whether you run loaners, how many technicians you employ — and review coverage options from there.

Tell us how your shop operates, and we can review where your current coverage may leave gaps.

Serving auto repair shops in St. Petersburg, Tampa, Clearwater, Largo, Pinellas Park, Brandon, and throughout Florida.