Insurance is the part of the lease packet everybody skims and the part that decides how bad a bad day gets. The names — bobtail, occ-acc, NTL, physical damage — don't all mean what they sound like, and two of them get confused for each other constantly. Here's the landscape, coverage by coverage.
Liability and cargo ride with the carrier's authority
Primary auto liability is the big one, and the first thing to understand is that it covers the public — the car you hit, not you or your truck. When you lease onto a carrier, this coverage rides with the carrier's MC number. Federal law sets the floor at $750,000 for most general freight under 49 CFR Part 387, but shippers and brokers commonly require $1,000,000 before they'll tender a load, so that's the figure you'll routinely see on a certificate.
Cargo insurance covers the freight itself — the load in the box, not the box. Under a lease-on it's also typically carried at the carrier level, with limits driven by what customers demand. Notice what's missing so far: neither of these coverages pays a dime toward your truck.
Physical damage is your problem — and your equity
Physical damage covers the tractor and trailer themselves — collision, fire, theft, the deer that never learn. It's value-based: you insure a stated amount, and the premium tracks that value. Any lender with a lien on your truck will require it, and if you own the truck outright it's technically optional — but be honest about whether you could absorb losing the thing that earns your living.
Two details matter more than the premium. First, the deductible — pick one you could actually write a check for in a bad week, not the one that made the quote look good. Second, the stated value — insure what it would really take to replace the truck, because under-insuring saves money right up until the day it doesn't.
Bobtail and non-trucking liability are not the same thing
When you're under dispatch, the carrier's primary liability has you. The question is what covers you when you're not — driving the tractor home, running to the shop on a Saturday morning. That's the job of bobtail and non-trucking liability coverage, and people use the two names interchangeably when they shouldn't.
Bobtail coverage follows the trailer: it applies when there's no trailer hooked, whether or not you're on carrier business. Non-trucking liability follows the purpose: it applies when you're not on carrier business, trailer or no trailer. The gap between them is real — pull an empty trailer somewhere for personal reasons and a pure bobtail policy may not be the one that responds.
Then there's the unladen or deadhead question. Running empty between loads under dispatch is usually the carrier's business and the carrier's liability — but 'usually' is doing a lot of work in that sentence, and this is exactly the kind of edge where policies differ. Ask the desk which policy responds when you're empty, and get the answer in writing.
Occupational accident is not workers' comp
As a company driver you had workers' compensation — a statutory system where state law sets the benefits and medical coverage generally doesn't run out. As an owner-operator you'll commonly be offered occupational accident coverage instead. Occ-acc can be decent protection, but it's a policy, not a statute: it has a medical cap, a disability benefit with a clock on it, exclusions, and definitions — and when the limits run out, they run out.
So read the occ-acc certificate the way you'd read a rate confirmation you don't trust. What's the medical maximum, how long does disability pay, what exactly counts as an occupational accident. And in some states, the line between who must be under workers' comp and who can elect occ-acc is genuinely legal territory — if your situation is murky, that's a question for a professional who works with trucking, not a truck-stop forum.
Who pays for what — read the lease, then the certificates
Under a lease-on, which side buys which coverage varies carrier to carrier, and federal law doesn't leave it to a handshake. The Truth-in-Leasing rules at 49 CFR Part 376 require the lease to spell out the carrier's obligation to maintain insurance for the public, what coverage you're responsible for, and — if any insurance is charged back to you — the amount of that charge, with a certificate of insurance available to you on request. If a recruiter's answer and the lease disagree, the lease is the answer.
So do the unglamorous thing: pull the actual certificates, not the sales pitch. For every coverage on the list, answer three questions — what does it pay for, who is covered, and when does it apply. That's one evening of reading against years of exposure, and once you've done it, nobody can hand-wave you. Know what pays, know who's covered, know when — your truck, your call.