COI tracking software for general contractors: what to compare

COI tracking software stores each subcontractor's certificate of insurance and its expiry date, and warns you before it lapses. Products differ mainly in who reads the certificate (a person, software or you) and who chases the sub; choose by those two answers, then by the price at the number of subs you manage.

This guide compares the approaches rather than ranking brands, so it stays accurate when vendors change. Whether a certificate meets your contract's limits and endorsements is a judgment for you or your insurance advisor, and no tracker replaces it.

What kinds of COI tracking software are there?

What should I compare?

1. Who reads the certificate? If the tool reads it, ask what it checks and what it misses.
2. Who chases the sub? The reminders are the work.
3. How does the sub send it? A link with no account suits occasional subs.
4. What happens at expiry? You want a flag on a list, not a notification you may miss.
5. Does it cover waivers too? If certificates and lien waivers arrive in the same month-end chase, one tool may serve both.
6. Price at your sub count, not the entry plan.

A poster in a contractor forum described a sub's certificate lapsing unnoticed for three weeks while the company collected everything by email and a spreadsheet. The failure was the date no one was watching, which is what any of these approaches fixes.

What does Waiver Chase do about COIs?

Waiver Chase is a light tracker built for general contractors, which collects certificates alongside lien waivers. Each sub gets a no-login upload link listing what is missing. The sub enters the expiry date and uploads the certificate (PDF, JPG or PNG, up to 4 MB); a date in the past is rejected at upload. You review it and accept or reject it with a reason. The expiry date of each accepted certificate is stored, the sub is asked for a renewal 30 days before, and an expired one shows in red on the tracker and in your digest the next morning. Reminders go out on weekday mornings, then stop and list the sub in your digest.

What does it not check?

Waiver Chase does not read the certificate. It does not check coverage limits, endorsements, named insureds or additional-insured wording, and the expiry date comes from what the sub enters, which you verify against the certificate. If you need a service to review the contents, choose a review service and look at whether you can pair it with a tracker.

How do subs and projects get in?

Upload or paste a CSV or Excel list with company, contact and email for each project, and map the columns once. There is no connection to Procore or your accounting system. Flag each sub as COI required or not. Each project has a tracker, and an exceptions list shows everything missing or expired across them all, with a ZIP packet of accepted waivers and certificates for the draw.

The free run on this page takes up to ten of your own subs and builds a certificate of insurance tracker, one row per sub, with the email each sub would get asking for a current certificate. Nothing is sent to them.

How do I pick between them?

Start from your sub count and what a lapse costs you. With under 30 subs and a few projects, a spreadsheet plus a weekly check is often enough. With more, or with subs who ignore email, the chase is the cost, so choose a tool that sends the request and the reminders. If your contract demands a detailed review of limits and endorsements on every certificate, add a review step by a person or a service, because a light tracker leaves that to you.

Ask each vendor for the same thing: show me what a sub receives, what I see when a sub does not answer, and what happens the day a certificate expires. The answers are quicker to compare than feature lists.

Where do lien waivers fit?

If you chase waivers monthly, the same email can ask for both. The lien waiver software guide compares those tools, and lien waiver management covers the monthly routine.

FAQ

Do I need COI tracking software for a handful of subs?

Often not. A spreadsheet with an expiry formula works for a small list; software pays off when the reminders take your time.

Can software confirm a certificate is valid?

Software can confirm a date and that a file arrived. Confirming limits and endorsements against your contract is a separate check, which you or your insurance advisor makes.

How early should the renewal request go out?

Thirty days is a common choice. Your contract or your subs' brokers may call for longer.