General Aggregate

The general aggregate is the overall cap on your GL policy's payments for premises liability, ongoing operations, personal and advertising injury, and medical payments during a single policy year. It is separate from the products-completed operations aggregate, which has its own limit. On a standard $1M/$2M GL policy, the $2 million general aggregate is the most the carrier will pay across all non-products/completed-ops claims.

For tree service companies running multiple crews daily, the general aggregate can erode faster than expected. Each property damage claim from a felled tree, each slip-and-fall by a bystander at your job site, and each advertising injury claim (yes, these happen — usually from allegations of copying a competitor's marketing) chips away at the aggregate.

Some contracts — particularly with large commercial property owners or government agencies — require a "per-project" or "per-location" aggregate rather than an annual aggregate. This means each job site gets its own full aggregate limit, preventing claims on one project from affecting coverage on another. Your carrier can add this via endorsement, though it typically increases your premium.

If your general aggregate is insufficient for your volume of work, the most cost-effective solution is usually an umbrella or excess liability policy. An umbrella with a $5 million limit sits above your primary GL and effectively provides $5 million of additional aggregate (in addition to the higher per-occurrence limit). For a busy tree service, this added aggregate capacity can be the difference between full coverage and a coverage shortfall.