Moon Insurance Managers, Inc. · TDI license #5595

Crane and Rigging Insurance in Texas

The hard question for a crane business is not whether it has liability insurance. It is who answers for the thing on the hook — somebody else’s property, in your hands, which is the kind of property a liability form is typically written to leave out.

For a crane service company the thing in your hands is the customer’s crane itself. This page is for both, from an independent agency on FM 1959 in southeast Houston.

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Start with the work

Two kinds of crane business

“Crane company” covers two operations that share a word and not much else. They answer to different OSHA standards, they meet different customers, and the property they are holding when something goes wrong is different. Which one you are decides the rest of this page.

Lifting and rigging contractors Construction jobs: Mobile, crawler and truck-mounted cranes set on somebody else’s site, a rigging crew hooking and guiding the load, and a general contractor’s insurance clause waiting at the gate. Crane rental belongs here too, and the first question about it is whether the crane goes out bare or with your operator in the seat.
Overhead crane service and inspection Inside plants: Bridge, gantry and hoist work on cranes the customer owns and has permanently installed — frequent and periodic inspections, load tests, repairs, parts. The crane never leaves the building, you are not the one running it day to day, and almost everything you touch belongs to the plant.

One lift, three questions

What is actually being insured

There is no single crane policy to buy. There is an assembly, and the reason to name its parts is that a lift puts three different kinds of property in play at once — and only one of them is yours.

The load on the hook Somebody else’s property, in your hands: Liability forms typically exclude damage to personal property in the insured’s care, custody or control. A generator you are setting, a vessel you are lifting into place, a press you are moving across a plant floor — whether that exclusion reaches it is a question to read in the wording and in the facts of who was directing the lift. Riggers liability is the coverage written for that gap.
The crane you are servicing The customer’s equipment on your bench: For a service company the same question arrives without a lift at all. The customer’s hoist, trolley or bridge is property in your care while you inspect or repair it, and liability forms commonly carry a second exclusion for the particular part you were working on when it was damaged. Both are worth reading before the first job, not after the first drop.
The crane itself Equipment, until it is on a truck: A crane you own is equipment that moves between jobs, which makes it an inland-marine floater question: scheduled by unit and value, with transit, rented-in cranes and a boom failing under load each worth asking about by name. A crane mounted on a truck chassis is also a vehicle, and that half is an auto question.

Around all three sits the liability form itself — the passer-by hurt under the swing, the building clipped by the boom, the work that fails after you have left. For a trade that is the contractors general liability page’s subject, and nothing about it is repeated here.

The gap this page exists for

The load is not yours, and that is the problem

A liability policy answers for damage you do to other people’s property. A crane company’s whole job is holding other people’s property in the air, and the standard way liability forms reconcile those two facts is an exclusion for personal property in the insured’s care, custody or control.

Whether that exclusion reaches a particular load is not settled by the word “crane”. It turns on the wording, on who owned the rigging, on who was directing the lift, and on whether the load was yours to move at the moment it fell. The honest position is that it is a question to read in the policy, in advance, rather than a conclusion anybody should reach for you in either direction.

Riggers liability is the name of the coverage written for property of others while you are lifting, lowering, moving or working on it. It is written on more than one basis — some forms respond only where you are legally liable, others regardless of fault — and the limit a contract names for it has to be measured against the most valuable thing you will have on the hook, not the average one. If a customer’s contract names riggers liability by that name, send us the clause.

Renting cranes out changes the same question rather than removing it. A bare rental hands the equipment over; an operated rental sends your operator with it, and who was in control of the lift is precisely the fact the care, custody or control question turns on.

Your own equipment

The crane is equipment, until it is on a truck

A crane you own is not a building and it is not a vehicle in the ordinary sense. It is equipment that travels between jobs, and it is insured on an inland-marine floater that schedules each unit at a value. The questions worth asking by name are the ones that separate one floater from another: whether a boom that fails under load is inside the form or excluded from it, what happens in transit, and whether a crane you have rented from somebody else is covered while it is in your care — which rental agreements commonly make your responsibility.

A crane mounted on a truck chassis is also a vehicle. On the road it belongs on the auto policy, and set up and lifting it is a machine doing work, so which policy answers for that moment is a question to read in both wordings. What a truck is, how it is classified and what an operation with trucks buys is the commercial truck insurance page’s subject.

Lifting on construction jobs

What OSHA asks of operators, riggers and signal persons

On construction work, OSHA’s crane standard (29 CFR part 1926, subpart CC) covers power-operated equipment that can hoist, lower and horizontally move a suspended load. It comes with a long list of exclusions — excavators and loaders even when rigged to lift, forklifts unless configured with a winch or hook, come-a-longs and chainfalls, among others — so the first question is whether your equipment is in it at all.

Operators. Within that scope, § 1926.1427 requires the employer to make sure each operator is trained, certified or licensed, and evaluated before running the equipment. Certification comes one of two ways: from an accredited crane operator testing organization, which is portable between employers and valid for five years, or through an audited employer program, which is also five years and is not portable. The employer provides it at no cost to the employee. Certification and the employer’s own evaluation of the operator on the equipment are two separate duties, and the rule says in terms that a certificate cannot by itself make a person qualified. Derricks, sideboom cranes and equipment rated at 2,000 pounds or less sit outside this section, though their own training rules still apply.

Riggers. OSHA requires a qualified rigger for rigging used in crane assembly and disassembly (§ 1926.1404(r)(1)), and when employees are hooking, unhooking or guiding a load, or making the initial connection, within the fall zone (§ 1926.1425(c)(3)). Qualified is a demonstrated-ability standard (§ 1926.32(m)): a recognized degree, certificate or professional standing is one route, and extensive knowledge, training and experience is another. There is no rigger card in the rule.

Signal persons. Before giving signals, a signal person must be qualified by a third-party qualified evaluator or by the employer’s own qualified evaluator, with the documentation available at the site (§ 1926.1428). The employer’s version does not travel to another employer.

None of this is insurance, and meeting it does not create any. It is here because it is what a lift plan, a general contractor’s prequalification and an underwriter’s questions all lean on, and having the paperwork straight before the first conversation shortens it.

Sources: eCFR — 29 CFR § 1926.1400, scope; § 1926.1427, operator certification; § 1926.1401, qualified rigger; § 1926.32, qualified; § 1926.1404, assembly/disassembly; § 1926.1425, keeping clear of the load; § 1926.1428, signal person. Verified 28 September 2026.

Service and inspection in plants

Overhead cranes answer to a different standard

An overhead or gantry crane permanently installed in a facility is not governed by the construction crane rule. Even when it is used in construction, § 1926.1438(a) sends it to OSHA’s general-industry standard, 29 CFR 1910.179, instead — which is why the operator certification material above is the wrong rulebook for a crane service company’s customers. That standard still limits operation to designated personnel; it simply gets there a different way.

What 1910.179 does set is the service company’s world. Frequent inspections at daily to monthly intervals, with hooks and hoist chains inspected monthly against a certification record carrying the date, the inspector’s signature and the identifier of the hook or chain. Periodic inspections at one- to twelve-month intervals depending on the crane’s activity, severity of service and environment. Running ropes inspected thoroughly at least monthly, again with a certification record. Rated load tests of no more than 125 percent of rated load unless the manufacturer says otherwise, with the reports kept on file. And adjustments and repairs done only by designated personnel.

The standard places those duties on the employer, sets their intervals, and names no outside inspector and no license for the person doing the work. What the work produces is a signed record of your judgment about somebody else’s crane — and that record is the first thing anyone reads after a hook lets go.

Millwrights and equipment service companies are in the same position with a different machine. The press, the conveyor or the line you are setting, aligning or repairing belongs to the customer, and the care, custody or control question above is your question too, whether or not a crane is involved.

Sources: eCFR — 29 CFR § 1926.1438, overhead and gantry cranes; 29 CFR § 1910.179, overhead and gantry cranes. Verified 28 September 2026.

The Texas half

TDLR does not license crane operators

The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, the state’s occupational licensing agency, runs 41 programs, from air conditioning contractors to weather modification, with elevator and boiler safety among them. None of them is a crane or hoisting program. Texas is also not an OSHA-approved state plan: it is under federal OSHA jurisdiction, which covers most private-sector workers in the state, so the federal rules above are the ones that apply to them.

One narrow caution. Where a state or local government issues a qualifying crane operator license, OSHA’s operator rule requires the operator to hold it, and this page has not checked every city’s code. If the job is inside a city, the city’s own requirements are worth confirming for it.

Sources: TDLR — Regulated Industries; OSHA — State Plans. Verified 28 September 2026.

Pages that own the rest

Where the conversation moves

The certificate and the additional insured. A plant or a general contractor will usually want evidence before you are on site, and often wants to be named as an additional insured. A certificate reports what a policy says; it is the endorsement that grants anyone rights. How the three pieces of paper — certificate, additional insured and waiver — work on a trade’s jobs is set out on the contractors general liability page. Existing clients can ask for one through the certificate of insurance request desk.

Your crew. Workers’ compensation is elective for most private employers in Texas, and a plant’s or a general contractor’s contract may not let you on site without it. That decision, and what going without it actually gives up, is its own page.

The liability form in general. What a commercial general liability policy covers and what it excludes, for any business, is on the general liability page.

Have these ready

What to have ready for the first conversation

What the work is: lifting on construction jobs, rigging only, crane rental, overhead crane service and inspection, millwright or machinery work.
Each crane you own or finance: type, rated capacity, year, value, and whether it is mounted on a truck.
Cranes you rent from others, and the rental agreement’s insurance clause.
Whether you rent cranes out, and whether they go bare or with your operator.
Who operates: how each operator is certified and evaluated, and who your qualified riggers and signal persons are.
The heaviest and most valuable loads you handle, and whose property they are.
Where the work happens — construction sites, plants, yards — and the contract clauses those customers send.
Who is paid to work, how, and roughly what the payroll is.
Three years of losses, including the ones that closed without payment.

Crane and rigging insurance questions

What insurance does a crane company need in Texas?

There is no single crane policy. The usual assembly is a liability form for injury and damage around the work, riggers liability for property on the hook or in your care, an equipment floater for the cranes you own, and commercial auto for any crane mounted on a truck. Workers’ compensation is a separate decision. What your customers’ contracts require in writing is often the place to start.

Does general liability cover the load I am lifting?

Do not assume it does. Liability forms typically exclude damage to property in the insured’s care, custody or control, and a load on your hook is the textbook case of property somebody will say was in yours. Whether the exclusion applies turns on the wording and the facts. Riggers liability is the coverage written for that gap, and it is written on more than one basis, so the basis is a question to ask too.

Does Texas license crane operators?

TDLR, the state’s occupational licensing agency, does not license crane operators — none of its programs covers cranes. Texas is under federal OSHA jurisdiction, and on construction work OSHA requires the employer to have each crane operator certified and evaluated, with listed exceptions. Where a state or local government issues a qualifying crane operator license, OSHA requires the operator to hold it, so a city’s own rules are worth checking for the job.

Does OSHA require riggers to be certified?

No card is required. OSHA requires a qualified rigger in two named situations — rigging for crane assembly and disassembly, and hooking, unhooking or guiding a load within the fall zone — and qualified means demonstrated ability. A certificate is one way to show it, and extensive knowledge, training and experience is another.

We inspect and repair overhead cranes in plants. Which rules apply?

A permanently installed overhead or gantry crane is governed by OSHA’s general-industry crane standard, 29 CFR 1910.179, not by the construction crane rule. That standard sets the frequent and periodic inspection intervals, the certification records for hooks, chains and ropes, and load testing. It places those duties on the employer and names no outside inspector and no license for the person doing the work.

Is a truck-mounted crane insured as a vehicle or as equipment?

Both questions apply. On the road it is a vehicle and belongs on the auto policy. Set up and lifting, it is a machine doing work, and which policy answers for that moment is a question to read in both the auto and the liability wording rather than assume.

No obligation

Tell us what you lift and whose it is

Moon Insurance is an independent agency on FM 1959 in southeast Houston. Send what the work is — lifting on construction jobs, or service and inspection inside plants — the cranes you own or rent, and the contract clause driving the requirement, and the first call can start from the facts rather than from a limit somebody guessed at. There is no charge for a quote or an application.

From the library