Notaries Public Professional Indemnity Insurance — the UK requirement and how the market works

A short reference on the PI insurance obligation for notaries public in England and Wales — the Faculty Office requirement, the typical limit and cover shape, and the practical route to placement.

The regulatory position

Notaries public in England and Wales are regulated by the Faculty Office of the Archbishop of Canterbury under the Public Notaries Rules 2019 (as amended). Rule 11 requires every practising notary to hold and maintain professional indemnity insurance meeting the Faculty Office's minimum specification.

The current minimum limit of indemnity is £1,000,000 per claim, with cover written on an "any one claim" basis (i.e., no aggregate cap below the limit). The cover must respond to civil liability arising from the practice of notarial acts and, in most cases, will also respond to any concurrent solicitors' work where the notary is dual-qualified.

Where notarial PI sits alongside solicitors' PI

Approximately 90% of notaries in England and Wales are dual-qualified solicitors. Where a notary is also a practising solicitor within an SRA-regulated firm, the firm's SRA MTC-compliant PI cover will normally extend to notarial acts. The Faculty Office accepts SRA MTC cover as meeting the notarial requirement provided the SRA policy expressly includes notarial acts within the definition of professional services.

Where a notary is not currently practising as a solicitor — retired from the SRA roll, or acting only as a notary — a standalone notarial PI policy is needed. This is a small but active market with a handful of specialist insurers.

Scrivener notaries — a small and separate branch of the profession — are regulated by the Scriveners Company and have their own PI requirements broadly aligned with the Faculty Office minimum.

Claims patterns for notaries

Notarial acts are technical in nature and the claims history of the profession is relatively benign compared with general legal practice. The most common claim types:

• Failure to identify a signatory correctly under Money Laundering Regulations 2017 verification requirements.
• Errors in apostille or legalisation processing where a foreign authority rejects a document because of a defect in the notarial certification.
• Delay claims where a time-sensitive notarial act misses a foreign deadline.
• Errors in describing capacity of signatory (e.g., misidentifying a director as a proprietor).
• Confidentiality breaches around notarial-act contents.

Quantum is typically modest — the Faculty Office minimum £1m per claim covers the vast majority of notarial claims. Higher limits are appropriate where the notary handles substantial commercial transactions, cross-border corporate work, or international property conveyancing.

Run-off cover

Faculty Office rules require run-off cover for at least six years after a notary ceases to practise, aligned with the primary limitation period for negligence claims under section 5 of the Limitation Act 1980. See our limitation-periods reference for how the fifteen-year long-stop under section 14B and the potential extension under section 14A affect this position in practice.

For dual-qualified notaries who are also SRA solicitors, run-off will typically be provided as part of the firm's SRA-compliant run-off cover on cessation.

Placement in practice

For a dual-qualified notary within an SRA firm, no separate placement is usually required — the firm's PI covers the notarial work. The proposal form to the firm's PI insurer should disclose the notarial activity and the volume of notarial acts per year.

For a standalone notary (retired from SRA roll or notary-only), the specialist market is narrower. Two or three UK-authorised insurers regularly quote. A broker familiar with the segment will approach these directly rather than through the mainstream SRA-MTC market.

Related Apex references

• Solicitors PI Insurance UK Guide 2026 — the pillar
• Limitation periods in professional negligence
• Run-off cover explained
• Insurance Act 2015 — Fair Presentation