JAN-PRO

The Jan-Pro Unit Franchise Agreement (Section 14.1) requires you to carry general liability insurance at $1,000,000 per occurrence and $2,000,000 in the aggregate, automobile liability at $1,000,000, workers' compensation as required by your state, and a janitorial bond of at least $50,000.

The named insured on your certificate is your own legal business entity — the LLC or corporation you operate through. Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. is the franchisor. Your agreement requires you to name Jan-Pro and the regional franchise developer as additional insureds. Your policies must be primary and non-contributory with the franchisor's insurance. Your general liability policy may not contain an exclusion for property in your care, custody, or control.

That satisfies your franchisor. Here is where the requirement ends and your real exposure as a commercial janitorial unit franchisee begins.

The franchisor entity is Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. a Massachusetts corporation with its principal business address at 2520 Northwinds Parkway, Suite 375, Alpharetta, Georgia 30009. The January 2026 Unit Franchise Agreement (Section 14.1) requires you to carry insurance naming Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. and your regional franchise developer as additional insureds.

What the agreement requires you to carry:

General Liability at $1,000,000 per occurrence and $2,000,000 in the aggregate, on a comprehensive form, primary and non-contributory. General liability is the policy that pays when your operations cause bodily injury or property damage to a third party. The policy may not contain an exclusion for property in your care, custody, or control — because you clean inside other people's buildings, often after hours, and that prohibition keeps coverage intact for the work you actually do.

Automobile Liability at a minimum of $1,000,000 bodily injury and property damage, covering owned, hired, and non-owned vehicles. Hired and non-owned coverage matters if your cleaners drive their own cars to accounts and you do not own a fleet.

Workers Compensation at the greater of $100,000 or the minimum required by your state, for you and all your employees, plus all unemployment insurance required by state and federal law. Workers' compensation covers medical bills and lost wages for an injured cleaner — an injury that happens in a client's building is still a workers' compensation claim.

Janitorial Bond of at least $50,000. The bond is supposed to respond when an employee steals from a client. The agreement requires it, but the bond has structural limits that matter enormously in a commercial cleaning setting. More on that below.

Primary and Non-Contributory. Your policies pay first and cannot seek contribution from Jan-Pro's or the regional developer's insurance. Primary and non-contributory means your insurer cannot ask the franchisor's carrier to share the loss.

Certificates of Insurance must be provided before your start date and renewed annually. Your carrier must give 30 days written notice of cancellation or non-renewal, and 10 days notice for non-payment.

All coverage must be written by an insurance company with a minimum A.M. Best rating of A or better, as approved by the franchisor.

The Jan-Pro Unit Franchise Agreement requires a janitorial bond of at least $50,000. Most unit franchisees buy the bond, satisfy the requirement, and move on. The trouble is that a janitorial bond is not the same thing as a crime insurance policy, and the difference becomes visible exactly when a claim arrives.

A janitorial bond is a three-party fidelity instrument: the surety company, your business, and your client. It is designed to pay the client if your employee steals their property. But it carries two traps that undermine the most common commercial cleaning theft scenario. First, most janitorial bonds pay only after the accused employee is criminally convicted of the theft. A credible accusation with no witness, no footage, no charge, and no conviction — the most realistic scenario in after-hours commercial cleaning — triggers nothing. Second, the surety expects to be reimbursed by your business after it pays. It behaves more like credit than insurance.

General liability insurance does not fill this gap. General liability covers bodily injury and property damage from accidents — not dishonesty. An employee theft claim falls under the dishonesty exclusion and is removed from a standard general liability policy.

A third-party commercial crime policy is the right instrument. 

It pays for your employee's theft of a client's property without requiring a criminal conviction. The insurer does not seek reimbursement from you. It is simply coverage — written for the risk that commercial janitorial creates every time a crew enters a building after hours.

One more detail that matters in this trade: ask for the Loss Discovered form. Crime policies come two ways. A loss-sustained form covers theft only if it both happened and was discovered during the same policy period. A loss-discovered form covers theft found during the policy period, no matter when the theft actually began. In commercial cleaning, crews work in the same buildings for months or years. A theft pattern often runs quietly for a long time before a client notices. Loss Discovered is the form that still responds when the discovery comes after the policy renews.

Keep the $50,000 bond your agreement requires. But carry the crime policy as the real protection — at a limit that matches what actually sits inside a commercial building.

Jan-Pro operates through a three-tier structure. Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. sits at the top. Regional franchise developers — the master franchisees — license territory from Jan-Pro and sell unit franchises and cleaning accounts to unit franchisees. You, as a unit franchisee, are the one cleaning the account.

That structure produces the most common and most dangerous coverage confusion in commercial janitorial: the assumption that someone above you in the chain carries insurance that reaches your work. It does not.

Jan-Pro's corporate insurance protects Jan-Pro. The regional developer's insurance protects the regional developer. Neither policy extends to your operations, your crew, your vehicle, or your clients. When a slip-and-fall happens in a building you clean, when a client's property is damaged, when your cleaner is injured at an account — those claims run against your policy, named to your business entity.

This matters most around two things. First, the additional-insured requirement: your franchise agreement requires you to name both Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. and your regional developer as additional insureds on your general liability and auto policies. Get that naming right before you start accounts — confirm the exact entity names and provide a certificate showing both. Second, workers' compensation: the agreement requires you to carry it for yourself and your employees. Your cleaners are your payroll responsibility. Do not assume the regional developer carries workers' compensation for your workers.

One common misunderstanding in this structure: a unit franchisee who participates in the Business Protection Program through the regional developer and assumes it covers everything. It does not. If you participate in the Business Protection Program, confirm exactly which lines are included and what the actual limits are for your entity. If you buy outside the program, confirm the same things — with a carrier and limits tailored to your accounts.

Commercial cleaning means applying disinfectants, floor cleaners, and degreasers around other people's surfaces, flooring, and equipment. When a chemical strips a finish or etches a material, a claim follows. Whether you are covered depends on two provisions working together.

The first is the care-custody-control exclusion. Standard general liability policies remove coverage for property in your control or being worked on when it is damaged. The Jan-Pro Unit Franchise Agreement addresses this directly by prohibiting the care-custody-control exclusion on your general liability policy. That is an important requirement confirm that your actual policy complies, because many off-the-shelf policies still include the exclusion by default even when an agreement forbids it.

The second is scope and severity. The Business Protection Program lists Extended Property Damage coverage at $1,000,000 per occurrence as a recommended option in Section 14.1.5. That reflects the reality that in a commercial building flooring, equipment, data infrastructure, tenant improvements damage from a cleaning chemical or an overflowing mop bucket can run into six figures when multiple suites are affected. Standard general liability limits apply across all your claims combined. A single large property damage incident in the wrong facility can exhaust a $1M/$2M stack and leave subsequent claims unprotected.

The Business Protection Program's Care, Custody and Control endorsement and Extended Property Damage option are the coverages written for exactly this risk. If your accounts include healthcare facilities, high-finish offices, or buildings with sensitive equipment, those options belong in your program whether through the Business Protection Program or purchased separately through your own carrier.

Your premium depends on details specific to your operation. What you can understand is how the number is built — and the reconciliation that catches franchisees at year-end.

Workers compensation is usually the largest line for a commercial janitorial business because the model is labor-intensive. Carriers use a standard formula: your payroll divided by 100, multiplied by your state's rate for the cleaning classification, multiplied by your experience modification. The rate per $100 of payroll is set by your state's rating bureau — the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) in most states, or an independent bureau in others. The insurance company does not choose the rate. It applies the state's number to your payroll and runs the same year-end reconciliation. NCCI code 9014 applies to janitorial services including commercial cleaning.

Both workers compensation and general liability are auditable. An audit is the carrier's year-end review that compares the revenue or payroll you estimated when the policy started against what actually happened, then adjusts the premium up or down. An audit that finds you overestimated sends money back. One that finds you underestimated sends a bill.

For commercial janitorial, general liability is often rated on gross receipts. Here is a simple example. You estimate $150,000 in cleaning revenue when the policy starts. You add three accounts mid-year and finish at $240,000. At a general liability rate of roughly $9 per $1,000 of revenue for commercial janitorial, the audit adds about $810 on that $90,000 difference. Workers' compensation runs the same way on payroll. Both bills usually arrive as a lump sum several months after the policy year closes.

For a commercial janitorial unit with a small crew of two to six people, a complete program — general liability, auto, workers' compensation, a third-party crime policy, and EPLI — commonly runs $6,500 to $12,000 per year. Workers' compensation is the variable that moves most with headcount. The crime policy is a small annual spend relative to the exposure it covers.

Subcontractor certificates are a common audit surprise. Many Jan-Pro unit operators bring in an extra cleaner during account surges. A 1099 cleaner who cannot show her own workers' compensation and general liability certificate is added to your exposure base at year-end. Her pay is charged premium as though she were your employee. Rikor's subcontractor compliance monitoring tool tracks those certificates in real time, so a lapse surfaces before the next account starts — not after the audit bill arrives. See how subcontractor compliance works →

 Collect a current certificate from every 1099 cleaner before she starts, and check the date.

Estimate your revenue and payroll close to reality when the policy begins. If you add accounts or cleaners during the year, ask your carrier for a mid-term adjustment. Spreading the increase across your remaining installments is far easier on cash flow than one surprise lump sum after the year closes.

The Jan-Pro Unit Franchise Agreement sets a practical foundation — general liability with no care-custody-control exclusion, auto at $1M, workers' compensation, and a bond — but several floors are too low for real commercial work, and two important coverages are missing entirely. The recommendations below are Rikor's baselines, calibrated to a newer commercial janitorial operator. They scale as your account book grows.

Replace the $50,000 janitorial bond with a $250,000 third-party crime policy — on a Loss Discovered form. The bond satisfies the agreement's wording and should remain in place if a specific customer contract names it. But carry the crime policy as the coverage that actually answers the claim — a $250,000 limit matches the value inside a typical commercial office account. 

Loss Discovered is the form to request; it responds to a theft pattern discovered after the fact, which is how commercial cleaning theft typically surfaces. The bond and the crime policy together give you both the compliance the agreement requires and the protection a real claim needs.

Raise employers liability from $100,000 to $1,000,000. The FDD floor of $100,000 each accident is below what a contested injury lawsuit costs to defend and resolve. Employers liability (EL) is the coverage that answers a serious worker-injury lawsuit filed outside the workers' compensation system. Rikor recommends $1,000,000 each accident, $1,000,000 disease per employee, and $1,000,000 disease policy limit.

Add EPLI at $250,000 — the FDD does not require it.

Employment practices liability insurance (EPLI) covers claims from current, former, or prospective employees — wrongful termination, discrimination, harassment, and wage disputes. The Jan-Pro unit model produces a high-turnover, part-time workforce cycling across accounts and shifts. That profile generates employment claims at higher rates than stable-headcount operations. The FDD leaves that exposure entirely uncovered. Rikor recommends a standalone EPLI policy at $250,000 for a newer operator, scaling toward $500,000 as you pass ten employees or $750,000 in annual cleaning revenue.

Add cyber liability at $250,000. Running commercial accounts requires a scheduling and billing platform. Customer account data, access credentials, and payment information create a data-breach exposure. The Business Protection Program's Electronic Data endorsement addresses software loss at $50,000 — that is a narrow coverage, not a full cyber liability policy covering breach notification, regulatory response, and social engineering losses. 

Rikor recommends a standalone cyber policy at $250,000.

Umbrella — driven by your commercial account mix. A commercial umbrella adds a limit layer above your general liability, auto, and employers liability for a claim that blows through the primary limits. Commercial janitorial works inside office buildings, medical facilities, schools, and institutional spaces. A single serious incident — water reaching server equipment, a fall in a cleaned corridor during morning hours — can escalate past a $1M general liability stack. More practically, many commercial customers and property managers require a certificate showing umbrella coverage of $1M or $2M above your primary lines before they award a contract. The right time to add the umbrella is before you bid those accounts. A $1M umbrella is a reasonable starting point for a unit operator actively pursuing commercial contracts; size it to what your specific accounts require.

Confirm the no-CCC-exclusion compliance. The franchise agreement prohibits the care-custody-control exclusion on your general liability policy. Verify your actual policy document complies. Many standard commercial policies include this exclusion by default, and it often survives a binding even when the agreement forbids it. A policy that contains this exclusion leaves you out of compliance with the franchisor and uninsured for the property damage claims your cleaning work creates.