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Ricardo Said:

If I register my three vehicles to a business will the insurance be less expensive?

We Answered:

It will personally cost you less to insure your autos with your commercial policy, but it won't actually cost less to insure the vehicles. If you use them in your business, and you have personal auto policy coverage on them, you have to pay an extra charge because of business usage. If you have them on a commercial auto policy, the extra expense of business usage is already figured in. You should talk to your insurance agent about how is best for you to do this.

In my opinion, if the autos are used primarily for personal use and only occasionally used for business, then it would likely cost less to insure them on a personal auto policy with an endorsement covering them for business use. If the autos get a lot of use in your business, then the insurer might require you to insure them on a commercial policy with an endorsement establishing the personal use of the autos.

By your question, I am thinking that you own a small business. If you do, it is likely to be in your best interest to have both your personal insurance and your commercial insurance handled by the same agent. It might also be reasonable to have both your personal insurance and your commercial insurance carried by an insurance company that does both personal and commercial insurance.

All in all, the money will have to come from somewhere. It will either come out of your personal pocket book or the business pocket book. Actually, the commercial auto insurance costs a bit more than personal auto insurance (at least at the insurance company I work for). However, your agent can really tell you how it will affect you. If you have a lot of business usage on the vehicles, you might have no choice but to go with the commercial insurance. If your business makes a lot of money, and you want to save yourself personal money, you still might want to go with the commercial policy . Where I work, the cost for insuring a personal auto with an endorsement for business use is less than insuring the same auto as a commercial auto. (I know. My husband is a pastor and we are required to add the business use on because he might happen to take a parishioner in the car with him somewhere. On the other hand, he is a chaplain at a retirement facility and if he were to take someone with him from the facility, his company would require him to drive a company vehicle, but it is still the rules of my company that the auto has to be endorsed for business use. Insuring our vehicles on a commercial policy would cost us more than simply endorsing our personal policy for business usage.)

The insurance company I work for has a lot of business owners who insure their personal autos on a business policy. There is one business we insure in a midwestern state. There is not one single location outside of one particular midwestern state. However, in that policy package* we have a work comp and auto policy in Florida. The owner of the business is retired and has his personal autos and his housekeeper in Florida insured on his commercial policy even though it would cost less to insure the auto on a personal policy. (The work comp on the housekeeper would cost the same either way.) His business makes a lot of money. It is one of the perks of being the owner. (However, he can't insure his residence on his commercial policy package.)

The thing you need to consider: Just how much business usage will the autos get? Is your business big enough to afford you that perk if you don't actually have to get them insured on a commercial policy? You will need to discuss this with your agent. He can help you determine if you really need commercial or not. If you don't have to have commercial, he can get you a quote both for personal auto with business use endorsement and for commercial with personal use. You can figure out which will be best for you. You should discuss all options with him. There are also other matters that may need to be dealt with depending upon your situation. Your agent should be able to discuss this with you. (I'll run out of space on Yahoo Answers before I could explain all of the possible courses of action that can be done with possible endorsements on a commercial policy to handle all of the issues that could be encountered. And I don't know just what your actual situation is to tell if they would apply to you.)

* To all of the insurance people out there, yes, I know that not all of the parts of the insurance policy package to which I referred are actually eligible to be part of a policy package by the "correct" definition. My company makes policy groupings for insureds by their needs and refers to them as policy packages, but uses the "correct"
definition to determine discounts.

April Said:

Do I need non-owned vehicle insurance for my pizza delivery business?

We Answered:

I'll let you decide.

First, let me tell you what the coverage is.

If one of your employees is delivering a pizza in their own car, and they hit a pedestrian and kill them, the lawyer is going to sue you, because they were acting in the course of their employment.

Do you WANT to have any coverage, if you get a million dollar lawsuit against you? If so, you need the coverage.

Alternatively, you can buy a car, and insure it on your business insurance policy, and let your employees use that car to deliver the pizzas.

Whatever you mean by standard business owner policy, well, coverage is NOT standardized! So if you HAVE no nonowned auto liability under that policy, then you DON'T get that protection.

Janet Said:

Is my business vehicle purchase tax deductible?

We Answered:

Dear M: You are correct. Sch C is your form for income and expenses. Use actual mileage and save your self a lot of calculations at tax time. Keep very detailed log of business mileage (odometer readings every AM vs. PM). If you decide to use actual expense vs. standard, get some help or review Sch C instructions for the vehicle expenses. Don't forget tools, advertising and other work related expenses.

This advice was prepared based on our understanding of the tax law in effect at the time it was written as it applies to the facts that you provided. Click on my profile to read more Errol Quinn Enrolled Agent

Nicholas Said:

Will my insurance cover my business vehicle?

We Answered:

No, if the car is used for business purposes it must be under a commercial policy to have coverage. They are sticklers about this, so make sure you get a commercial policy ASAP.

Ramona Said:

Can I add my business vehicle to my normal auto insurance policy?

We Answered:

If you just use the vehicle to buy paper clips you could state that you don't need a vehicle at all to run your business... after all who is to say that you are running a vehicle in the course of a business if you have a box of paper clips in your car????
But since you need your clips to run your business, you could deduct your car expenses from your taxes, including your business car insurance.
You could then drop your normal policy and just use your business car for private use. Obviously you would have to declare that a proportion of the time that the car is used isn't for business, let's say 50/50 in that case you can only deduct 50% of the car expenses off your taxes including half what you will spend to buy your car etc etc.
Your accountant will know, if you don't have one, ask your taxman, they should explain.

Gwendolyn Said:

Do auto insurance rates for a business increase if and when they put the company name on the vehicle?

We Answered:

Signs on the vehicle have nothing to do with insurance rates; using the vehicle for business purposes will cause an increase in rates