Bobtail and Deadhead
Coverage
If your business is a
trucking operation, you should be familiar with the terms, bobtailing and
deadheading. A tractor that is traveling on the road without a trailer is
considered to be bobtailing.
Example: Joe has dropped his trailer off at ABC trucking and is traveling back
home. He is bobtailing.
Example: Joe drops his trailer at Fran’s bakery and then heads to Doug’s Plumbing supplies to pick up a trailer. In between the two
customers, he is bobtailing.
Any time a tractor is
pulling an empty trailer, it is considered deadheading.
Example: Mary ran a load of apples from
These situations should not
be a concern since tractors and trailers owned by your business are always
covered. Further, operators whose tractors and trailers your business hires out
for service to other parties are covered during their time of hire.
If you are an independent
trucker operating for hire with a trucking operation, there is a problem. Once an
independent trucker has completed his job, the insurance coverage provided by
the trucking operation ceases. The bobtail and deadhead situations are two of
the most common times when an independent trucker is operating outside the
trucking operation’s coverage.
An independent trucker may
buy a Commercial Truckers Policy and have coverage all of the time. However, this
is expensive and creates an issue of duplicate coverage. Another option would
be to buy a Commercial Business Auto Coverage Form policy and adding an
optional form that, via special wording, eliminates the double coverage
situation.
Example: Fergus has a tractor-trailer unit and normally does contract work with
ABC trucking. He decides to pick up some extra money by carrying a load for a
friend without going through ABC. He makes a mistake and strikes another
vehicle. With this endorsement, there is no coverage because he was operating
as a business. If he had just helped a friend, there would be coverage and if
he had contracted through ABC, ABC’s policy would have responded.
Next the optional form adds
a restriction so the policy does not respond to a loss involving anyone who is
in the business of transporting property for hire and who is responsible for
the named insured’s conduct is an insured.
Example: Fergus contracts with ABC Trucking to deliver a load of fruit. The
weight shifts and the trailer fishtails. Before he
regains control, he strikes two sedans, demolishing both vehicles. ABC trucking
cannot ask for coverage under Fergus’s policy because they are in the business
of transporting property for hire and they are also responsible for Fergus’
conduct.
While insurers are
typically quite open to providing the additional coverage to handle the extra
needs of independent truckers, some avoid operations involving vehicles that
regularly travel to areas where the insurer does not operate. The risk is
greater if there is regular bobtailing or deadheading in areas of dense traffic
or those that reflect abnormal highway accident frequency. For advice on
whether your firm has unprotected trucking-related exposure to loss, be sure to
discuss your situation with an insurance professional.
COPYRIGHT: Insurance Publishing Plus, Inc. 2006
All rights reserved. Production or distribution, whether in
whole or in part, in any form of media or language; and no matter what country,
state or territory, is expressly forbidden without written consent of Insurance
Publishing Plus, Inc.