Our question involves coverage for personal property used to maintain or service the building or structure.

Our insured has suffered a loss and has exhausted the contents coverage limit without replacing all of the insured's property. Our policy is an older form still in use that covers personal property used to maintain or service the building or structure, without the additional recently added language "or its premises."

Is the addition of "or its premises" substantive or simply a clarification? Can we look to this coverage to cover lawnmowers, snow blowers, lawn care tools, etc. in the absence of the "or its premises" language from the building coverage part?

Michigan Subscriber

The addition of the words "or its premises" to the coverage grant for personal property used to maintain or service the building or structure is a clarification of the intent of the policy and not a broadening of coverage. Even under the older language, it was the FC&S Bulletins' position that lawn care equipment was covered as personal property used to service the building; i.e., that cutting the grass was, in effect, servicing the building. The additional language simply makes clear the coverage that was already there.

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