Goods In Transit Insurance
Goods in transit covers property while it is being carried: your own stock and materials moving between premises and sites, or other people's goods that you are carrying for payment.
Own Goods Or Carried Goods
Those two situations are insured quite differently. Carrying your own goods means insuring property you own, and the sum insured is simply what a load is worth. Carrying somebody else's goods means insuring a liability, and what you are liable for is set by the conditions of carriage you trade under rather than by the value of the load.
That second point surprises people. Under common haulage conditions, liability is capped by the weight of the consignment rather than its value, which can leave a very large gap between what a customer lost and what you owe them. Whether that gap is good news or bad depends entirely on which side of it you are standing.
What Goods In Transit Insurance Covers
Own goods in transit
Your stock, materials or equipment while in your vehicle, against fire, theft, accident damage and loss. Sum insured is set per vehicle load rather than annually.
Carriers liability
Your liability for goods you carry for others, written to match the conditions of carriage you trade under. This is a liability cover, not a property cover, and the two should not be confused.
Loading and unloading
Damage occurring while goods are being put on or taken off the vehicle, which is when a surprising proportion of transit damage happens.
Temporary storage in transit
Goods held overnight or between legs of a journey, usually subject to conditions about where the vehicle is parked and whether the goods are in a secure building.
Debris removal and disposal
The cost of clearing a spilled or damaged load from the highway, which on a bulk load can run well beyond the value of the goods themselves.
Where The Cover Stops
Wordings differ between insurers, so treat these as the usual position rather than as universal fact. Where one of them matters to you, it is worth checking on your own schedule before you need to.
Overnight vehicle conditions
As with tools, most policies restrict theft from a vehicle overnight unless it is in a locked building or a secure compound. A loaded van left on the street is the classic declined transit claim.
Unattended vehicle
Leaving a vehicle unlocked, with keys in it, or out of sight for longer than the wording allows, will usually void a theft claim regardless of the hour.
Insufficient packing
Goods damaged because they were inadequately packed or secured are generally excluded. Sheeting, strapping and load security are the carrier's responsibility.
Specified excluded goods
Most policies exclude or restrict money, jewellery, tobacco, alcohol, electronics and livestock. If you carry any of them, they need naming rather than assuming.
Liability beyond your conditions of carriage
Carriers liability cover follows the terms you trade under. Accept a customer's contract that removes the weight based cap and you have taken on a liability your policy may not match.
Conditions Of Carriage Decide What You Owe
Hauliers in the UK commonly trade under standard industry conditions that limit liability to a figure per tonne of the consignment, rather than to the value of the goods. For dense, low value freight that is usually generous. For light, high value freight it can be a fraction of what the goods were worth.
This cuts both ways and you need to know which way round you are. If you are the carrier, trading under those conditions limits your exposure, and your carriers liability cover is written to match. If you are the customer sending the goods, it means the carrier may owe you far less than you lost, and you should be insuring the goods yourself rather than relying on them.
The trap is signing a customer's contract that overrides your standard conditions. A clause accepting full value liability is easy to miss and turns a capped exposure into an uncapped one, often without the insurer knowing.
Sums Insured Are Per Load, Not Per Year
Own goods transit cover is rated on the maximum value in any one vehicle at any one time, which is a different question from annual turnover and catches people out when a single large delivery goes out.
Work out the worst case rather than the average. A merchant whose vans usually carry £3,000 of stock but occasionally run a £20,000 delivery needs the higher figure, because average applies here as it does elsewhere and the claim will land on the day of the big load.
Where you run several vehicles, the limit is normally per vehicle. Confirm that, because a fleet wide aggregate behaves very differently when two vehicles are involved in the same incident.
Where Transit Cover Overlaps Other Policies
Transit sits next to several other covers and the boundaries matter. Your motor policy covers the vehicle, not the load. A shop or commercial policy covers stock at the premises, usually with a small transit extension that is rarely enough for regular deliveries. Tool cover insures equipment you work with rather than goods you are moving.
For trades, the practical question is usually whether materials bought for a job are covered between the merchant and the site. Often they are not, and on a large materials drop that is a real exposure sitting in the gap between the van policy and the contract works cover.
If you move anything of value regularly, it is worth mapping which policy picks it up at each point of the journey. The gaps are usually at the ends: loading, unloading and overnight.
What Moves The Price
We do not publish a starting price for this cover, because a figure that is not drawn from a policy we actually placed is worth nothing to you. What we can tell you is what the premium is built from.
- Maximum value of goods in any one vehicle
- What the goods are, and how attractive they are to thieves
- Whether you carry your own goods or goods for others
- The conditions of carriage you trade under
- Where vehicles are kept overnight, loaded or empty
- Annual carryings or turnover, and your claims record
We are a broker, so we take it to several insurers rather than quoting one. Call 02382 000820 and you will have a real figure rather than a range.
What We Need To Quote
- What you carry, described specifically
- Maximum value in any one vehicle at any one time
- Number and type of vehicles
- Whether goods are your own or carried for payment
- Your conditions of carriage, if you are a carrier
- Where loaded vehicles are parked overnight
Cover that often goes with this
The gaps we most often find sitting next to this policy.
- Motor fleetThe vehicles themselves, once you run more than a couple of them.
- Tool coverEquipment you work with, as opposed to goods you are moving.
- Shop insuranceStock at the premises, and the small transit extension that comes with it.
- Tradesman insuranceThe trade version of this, with tools and van cover built around it.
- All trades A to ZCover written for your specific trade rather than the general product.
- Talk to a brokerTell us what you do and we will say which of these you actually need.
Common questions
Does my van insurance cover the goods inside?+
No. A commercial vehicle policy covers the vehicle itself and your liability on the road. The load needs goods in transit cover, whether the goods are yours or somebody else's.
What is the difference between goods in transit and carriers liability?+
Goods in transit usually means insuring your own property while it moves. Carriers liability insures your legal liability for other people's goods that you carry for payment, and it is limited by your conditions of carriage rather than by the value of the load.
Why is liability limited by weight rather than value?+
Because standard UK haulage conditions set it that way, so a carrier can price a job without knowing what the goods are worth. It means a light, valuable consignment may be worth far more than the carrier is liable for, which is why senders of high value goods should insure the goods themselves.
Are goods covered overnight in the van?+
Subject to the overnight condition on the policy, which normally requires the vehicle to be in a locked building or secure compound. A loaded vehicle on the street overnight is excluded on most wordings.
Do I need transit cover for materials I buy for a job?+
If you collect and carry them yourself, yes, because nothing else picks them up between the merchant and the site. It is a common gap on trades who assume the contract works policy starts earlier than it does.
Other cover we arrange
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