Starting July 1, 2026, Ontario’s making most accident benefits optional to give you more control over your coverage.

Standard medical, rehabilitation and attendant care benefits are still mandatory, with the option to upgrade.

Newly optional benefits include: income replacement, non-earner support (also called “non-earner benefit”), housekeeping costs (also called ‘housekeeping and home maintenance’), damage to personal items, lost education costs (also called “lost educational expenses”), death benefit, funeral expenses, visitor expenses (also called “expenses of visitors”), dependant care, caregiver benefit, and inflation protection (also called “indexation benefit”).

Note: Before July 1, 2026, these coverages were automatically included.

Changes to who’s covered and how you make certain claims

Ontario’s also introduced two more big changes that’ll impact you and others. These changes start on July 1, 2026, regardless of your policy start date.

1. How you make medical and rehabilitation claims
Before, you’d use workplace or private benefits first to pay medical and rehabilitation costs if you were injured in a car accident. Your car insurance only kicked in after exhausting those benefits.

Now we’ll pay these claims first, so you can save your workplace or private benefits for when you need it most. This means faster approvals, fewer delays, and easier access to treatment so you can focus on recovery – not red tape.

2. Who’s covered by your accident benefits

Standard accident benefits

There are no changes to who’s covered under your standard accident benefits. They’ll still cover all passengers (including uninsured passengers), and pedestrians and cyclists (including uninsured pedestrians and cyclists).

Optional accident benefits

The optional accidents you buy will still cover:

• you (the named insured)
• the named insured’s spouse
• dependants of the named insured and of the named insured’s spouse (like children or ageing parents who live with you)
• anyone listed on the policy as drivers of the insured vehicle

The optional accidents you buy will no longer cover:

• pedestrians you may harm in an accident
• cyclists you may harm in an accident
• uninsured passengers that may be harmed in an accident in your vehicle

What should you do now?

1. Review your mandatory and optional accident benefits and limits.
2. Customize them to suit your situation. Coordinate with work or private benefits if you need to.
3. Update your policy if you’ve changed your optional benefits.
4. Download and review your policy documents after to ensure you’ve got the right coverage for you.

This is a big change – that’s why we’re here to help. Contact us if you have any questions.