How to Request a COI from a Vendor (With Email Template)

To request a COI from a vendor, send a written request that names your organization as the certificate holder, lists the exact coverages and minimum limits you require, states any endorsements you need such as additional insured and waiver of subrogation, and gives a deadline tied to the start of work. Ask the vendor to forward the request to their insurance agent, who issues the certificate. The clearer the request, the fewer rounds it takes to get a compliant certificate back.

Requesting a certificate of insurance sounds simple, but a vague request is why so many COIs come back wrong: short limits, missing endorsements, the wrong entity named, or coverage that does not match the work. Spell out what you need up front and most vendors return a correct certificate the first time. This guide covers exactly what to ask for, a template you can copy, and what to do when the certificate arrives.

What information do you need to request a COI?

A complete COI request tells the vendor's insurance agent precisely what to put on the certificate. At a minimum, give them your full legal entity name and address as the certificate holder, the coverages you require, the minimum limit for each, any endorsements the contract calls for, and a description of the work or project so the agent can confirm the policy actually covers it. If you leave any of these out, the agent fills in the gap with whatever is convenient, and you get a certificate that does not match your requirements.

The coverages you ask for should follow the contract, not a generic checklist. A janitorial vendor and a roofing contractor do not carry the same risk, so the limits and coverages you require should scale to the work. For a deeper look at how to set those numbers, see our guide to vendor insurance requirements.

What coverages and limits should you ask for?

Ask for the coverages your contract requires and set each minimum limit to the risk of the work. Most vendor requests cover commercial general liability, and depending on the vendor, add automobile liability, workers compensation, professional liability, and an umbrella or excess layer. Specify a per-occurrence and aggregate limit for general liability rather than a single number, because those are different things on the certificate.

Here are the coverages most commonly requested and what each one is for:

Coverage	What it covers	When to require it
Commercial general liability	Third-party bodily injury and property damage	Almost every vendor that performs work or comes on site
Automobile liability	Accidents involving the vendor's vehicles	Vendors that drive for the work or transport goods
Workers compensation	Vendor's own employees injured on the job	Any vendor with employees, often required by state law
Professional liability	Errors in professional advice or services	Consultants, designers, IT, and other advisory vendors
Umbrella or excess	Extra limit above the underlying policies	Higher-risk work where base limits are not enough

This is a common example, not legal or insurance advice. Set your own requirements to your contracts and applicable state and federal rules.

Should you require additional insured status?

If your contract requires it, yes. Being named additional insured on the vendor's policy extends the vendor's coverage to defend and protect your organization for claims arising from their work, which a certificate holder listing alone does not do. Spell out in the request that you need additional insured status by endorsement, and say whether you need it for ongoing operations, completed operations, or both. The difference matters, and we cover it in detail in additional insured vs certificate holder.

The same goes for primary and noncontributory wording and a waiver of subrogation. If the contract calls for them, name them explicitly in the request, because the agent will not add an endorsement you did not ask for. Naming each endorsement up front is the single biggest reason a certificate comes back compliant on the first try.

COI request email template

Here is a template you can adapt. Send it to your vendor contact and ask them to forward it to their insurance agent.

Subject: Certificate of Insurance Request, [Your Company Name]

Hello [Vendor Name],

Before we begin work under our agreement dated [date], we need a current certificate of insurance from your insurance agent. Please forward this request to them and ask that the certificate include the following:

Certificate holder: [Your full legal entity name and address]
General liability: [e.g. $1,000,000 per occurrence / $2,000,000 aggregate]
Automobile liability: [e.g. $1,000,000 combined single limit]
Workers compensation: [statutory limits]
Additional insured: [Your entity], by endorsement, for ongoing and completed operations
Other endorsements: primary and noncontributory; waiver of subrogation in our favor
Description of operations: [brief description of the work or project]

Please have the certificate emailed to [your email] by [deadline]. We cannot schedule work to start until we have a compliant certificate on file. Thank you.

Keep the template specific to the contract. The more precisely you state the limits and endorsements, the less back-and-forth it takes.

How long does it take to get a COI?

Most vendors can return a certificate within one to three business days, because the agent simply issues a certificate against policies the vendor already has in force. It takes longer only when the vendor has to add coverage or an endorsement they did not previously carry, such as naming you as additional insured. Build that lead time into your onboarding so you are not waiting on a certificate the week work is supposed to start.

What do you do when the COI arrives?

Do not just file it. A certificate is only useful if you check it against what you asked for. Confirm the right entity is named, the coverages are present, every limit meets your minimum, the endorsements you required are shown, and the policy dates cover the period of the work. Then verify the certificate is genuine and the carrier is rated, which we walk through in how to verify a certificate of insurance.

Checking and tracking certificates by hand works for a few vendors and falls apart at scale. A COI tracking system reads each certificate with AI, checks it against the requirement you set for that vendor, chases renewals, and keeps a dated record, so you are not re-reading PDFs every time a contract or audit asks. To collect, verify and monitor every vendor certificate in one place, that work runs on vendor insurance compliance software.

How often should you request an updated COI?

Request a fresh certificate at every policy renewal, which for most vendors is annual, and any time a contract is extended or the scope of work changes. Tracking renewal dates and chasing the next certificate before the current one expires is exactly the repetitive work that slips when it is done by hand, which is why most organizations automate the reminders rather than relying on a calendar.

Frequently asked questions

Who issues a certificate of insurance, the vendor or the agent?

The vendor's insurance agent or broker issues the certificate, not the vendor directly. You send the request to the vendor, and the vendor forwards it to their agent, who prepares the certificate against the vendor's active policies and emails it to you. That is why a request that clearly states your requirements matters: the agent issues what is asked for.

Can a vendor start work before you receive the COI?

You should not let work start before a compliant certificate is on file, because that is the window where an uninsured loss leaves you exposed. Make a current, compliant COI a condition of starting, state that in the request, and build enough lead time into onboarding that the certificate arrives before the start date rather than after.

What if the COI comes back with the wrong limits or missing endorsements?

Send it back with a specific note of what is missing, referencing the exact limit or endorsement your contract requires. Most corrections are quick for the agent to reissue. The reason certificates come back wrong is almost always a vague original request, so tightening the request prevents most repeat rounds.

Is a certificate of insurance proof that coverage is in force?

A certificate is evidence that the listed policies existed when it was issued, but it is a snapshot, not a guarantee that coverage is still in force today. A policy can be cancelled or non-renewed after the certificate is issued, which is why requesting a COI once is not enough and ongoing monitoring matters as much as the initial request.

Requesting the certificate is one step in onboarding a vendor. Once the COI is in hand, teams usually move to signing the vendor agreement, which you can handle with online document e-signing, extracting the vendor's W-9 and license details from their onboarding documents with AI document data extraction, and issuing the first purchase order once the vendor is approved. Handling the COI well at the start keeps the rest of the relationship clean.

PDF, JPG, PNG, BMP, HEIC, TIFF