What is a CG 20 11 endorsement?

The practical answer

CG 20 11 is the ISO form titled Additional Insured: Managers or Lessors of Premises. It is the endorsement a tenant's general liability policy uses to add the landlord, and usually the managing agent, as an additional insured for the space the tenant leases.

It is the leasing counterpart to the contractor forms. Where CG 20 10 attaches additional insured status to work being performed, CG 20 11 attaches it to a leased premises, and the boundaries written into the form follow that logic closely.

What the form grants

The endorsement adds the person or organization shown in its schedule as an additional insured, but only with respect to liability arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use of that part of the premises leased to the named insured, and shown in the schedule.

So the grant is bounded by the demised premises. A slip in the tenant's own suite is squarely inside it. A slip in a shared lobby, a parking structure or a common corridor is a harder argument, and is usually the landlord's own general liability exposure rather than the tenant's.

The exclusions written into the endorsement

• Structural alterations, new construction and demolition operations performed by or on behalf of the additional insured are excluded. A landlord doing a fit-out cannot reach the tenant's policy for it.
• Coverage does not extend past the end of the lease for that premises, so status is tied to occupancy.
• It is a scheduled form. The premises and the additional insured both appear in the schedule, which means a lease renewal with a changed suite number can leave the endorsement pointing at the wrong space.
• Later editions narrow the trigger and cap the grant at what the lease requires and at what the jurisdiction permits, in the same way the contractor forms were narrowed.

What a landlord or property manager should require

A lease insurance clause that produces usable evidence asks for more than the endorsement alone:

• Additional insured status by endorsement for both the owning entity and the management company, named exactly as they appear on the lease.
• The premises description in the schedule matching the demised premises in the lease, including suite or unit number.
• General liability limits that reflect the use, with higher limits for tenants who cook, serve alcohol, admit the public in volume, or work above ground level.
• Primary and non-contributory wording, which comes from a separate endorsement.
• A waiver of subrogation where the lease has mutual waivers, which is common and is frequently missed on the tenant's side.
• Tenant improvements and betterments coverage on the property side, and business interruption where the lease makes the tenant responsible for continuing rent.
• Umbrella limits confirmed as sitting above the general liability policy rather than over an unrelated schedule.

Verifying it on a certificate

Ask for the endorsement pages with the certificate. The ADDL INSD column tells you somebody believes status exists and nothing else. Read the schedule for the entity name and the premises description, confirm the policy number and effective dates match the certificate face, and note the edition date beside the form number.

Then diary the lease dates alongside the policy dates. Tenant certificates fail quietly at two moments: the policy renews and nobody sends the new one, or the lease is amended and the schedule still describes the old space.