Where Contractors Have Room at Renewal — and Where They Don’t

John Hubbard, CRIS, is a producer at USI Insurance Services in Irvine, California, specializing in contractor insurance. His answers arrive as contractors enter renewal season with property capacity opening up but casualty lines staying tight. He works the renewal cycle year-round, not just in the 90-day window, and his focus on loss-control evidence over transaction timing shapes how carriers price risk. These six exchanges lay out where leverage exists, where it doesn’t, and what separates accounts that consistently outperform the market.

Q1. At renewals right now, where are contractors actually getting room, and where is there none?

Property is where contractors generally have more leverage right now. There is more capacity, and well-performing accounts have an opportunity to improve pricing or terms. Workers’ compensation can also be competitive for contractors with good loss experience and a strong safety story. Organizations that have robust hiring, training, supervision and a safety culture consistently have minimal claims, lower X-mods and a much better opportunity to attract carrier offerings with better rates and then to negotiate more credits.

The harder conversation is still casualty, particularly commercial auto and umbrella/excess.

If you have a large fleet, difficult loss history or significant severity exposure, there isn’t nearly as much room. It is imperative that organizations integrate all the ways to secure maximum credits — telematics, robust fleet safety and driver training.

Q2. Property pricing is softening while casualty stays hard. How are you advising clients to use that split?

I don’t want a contractor celebrating a property decrease if we’re giving that money right back on auto or excess. We look at the insurance program as one portfolio. If competition creates savings on property, that gives us an opportunity to look at deductibles, limits, umbrella structure, loss-control investments or other places where a dollar can produce a better return. The goal isn’t to win one line of coverage. It’s to build a better overall program.

Q3. Which comp class-code or ex-mod mistakes cost contractors the most, and how do they surface?

The expensive mistakes are often surprisingly basic: employees assigned to the wrong classifications, payroll not properly reported, inaccurate ownership information, claims that remain open or develop worse than expected, and incorrect information feeding the experience modification calculation. I also pay close attention to construction classifications where wage thresholds affect classification. These problems often don’t announce themselves as an error. They surface as an unexpectedly high Mod, an audit surprise or a workers’ compensation premium that simply doesn’t make sense relative to the contractor’s operations.

Key issues he listed:

• Effective September 1, 2026, the WCIRB (CA) raised the dual-wage hourly threshold for eligible construction classifications — contractors must pay higher wage rates and maintain proper time records to continue receiving dual-wage premium credits.
• Three small frequency claims that total $60,000 are more impactful on the MOD than one large severity claim that totals $60,000.
• Your three-year elevated premium from your work comp claims divided by an organization’s margin equals the revenue that is stolen to pay down the premium increase — revenue that could have been directed at fuel, retention and payroll.
• Your broker should be doing more than generating a quote at renewal; they need to be helping to uplevel your program across the policy year and enhancing the opportunity to improve carrier confidence in your company.

Three small frequency claims that total $60,000 are more impactful on the MOD than one large severity claim that totals $60,000.

Your three-year elevated premium from your work comp claims divided by an organization’s margin equals the revenue that is stolen to pay down the premium increase — revenue that could have been directed at fuel, retention and payroll.

Q4. What do you check first when a contractor says their program “looks fine”?

I start with the losses. A policy can look fine on paper while the underlying claims tell a completely different story. I want to know what’s driving frequency and severity, whether claims are developing in the wrong direction, how quickly incidents are being reported and whether the same type of loss keeps happening. Then I look at whether the program structure still matches the business. Contractors change. Payroll grows, fleets grow, operations change and larger projects create different contractual requirements. A program that was right three years ago may not be right today.

Q5. One thing you’d tell a contractor to do 90 days before renewal, not 9 days.

Build the underwriting story before the underwriter builds it for you; that story begins after the completion of each renewal and includes hiring practices, supervisor training, driver/fleet safety, tracking leading/lagging indicators and so on. Before unit stat filing a broker should be closing and compressing claims so the renewal Mod has a downward trajectory; that is why I advise a year-round renewal strategy rather than just a 90-day traditional approach.

By ninety days out, I want current loss information, payroll and revenue projections, fleet data, large-loss explanations, safety improvements and anything else that demonstrates how the risk has changed. Carriers also are looking for proof that policies result in employee training, dripline and behavior change. If there was a bad claim, don’t hide from it. Explain what happened and, more importantly, what changed afterward. Nine days before renewal you’re negotiating a transaction. Ninety days before renewal you still have time to influence how the market views the risk.

Nine days before renewal you’re negotiating a transaction. Ninety days before renewal you still have time to influence how the market views the risk.

Q6. What separates contractors who consistently outperform the insurance market? (his addition)

The best-performing contractors don’t treat insurance as something they deal with once a year. They manage claims, safety, fleet performance, contractual risk transfer and their experience modification throughout the year. By renewal, we’re not trying to invent a good story. We already have twelve months of evidence.

John Hubbard, CRIS — Producer, USI Insurance Services LLC

Updated Nov 1, 2026 — added the free renewal room quick card, contractor renewal room pack, and renewal story AI playbook downloads to this guide.