Indemnity insurance for your business

With traditional brokers and many insurers, buying professional indemnity insurance can often involve completing a lot of paperwork just to get a quote, which can be frustrating and time-consuming.

However, because professional indemnity is an important type of cover for many businesses, we've worked with our insurance providers to simplify the process. With Simply Business, you can buy online either as part of a full business insurance policy or as a stand-alone policy.

• compare professional indemnity quotes
• one simple policy for professional indemnity and public liability
• buy professional indemnity as a stand-alone policy
• cover levels to suit you: from £50k up to £5m

What does professional indemnity insurance cover?

You should consider taking out professional indemnity insurance if your business gives advice or offers a professional service to other businesses. It covers you if you are negligent or make a mistake which causes a client’s business to suffer financial loss.

For example, if an architect makes a mistake in the plans for a construction project and it is only discovered once the building work is underway and materials are purchased, the client would be likely to lose money through time for re-building and the cost of wasted materials. The architect would be liable for this cost.

Types of business that often take out professional indemnity include accountants, IT consultants, business consultants, journalists, architects, financial advisors, engineers and many more.

An example of a professional indemnity claim:

An employee accidentally sent an email containing confidential customer information to an incorrect party. The customers sued the firm for breach of confidentiality.

What did the insurance company pay?
The professional indemnity claim costing £35,000, including legal costs covered by the insurance policy.

What did the insurance company not cover?
£250 excess plus the cost of loss of reputation of the firm and loss of future contracts from that customer.

What level of professional indemnity cover do you need?

In many cases, the client dictates the level of professional indemnity required. But, even where this is not the case, it is worth finding out their expectations as to insurance before taking on the work.

Simply Business offers a minimum of £50,000 of professional indemnity cover and a maximum of £5 million.

Details to look out for when you buy professional indemnity insurance

• Check the exclusions on the policy before purchasing it
• Find out what level of cover your clients expect
• The policy includes legal expenses cover