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Professional indemnity help
If you are struggling to get or keep professional indemnity insurance, you are not alone, and most problems have a known route forward. This page brings together the eight situations professionals raise with us most often, why each happens and where to go next.
Part of: Professional indemnity insurance
In short
Most PI cover problems fall into eight groups: a renewal price rise, a decline or an insurer leaving the market, a refused renewal, claims or notified circumstances, worse terms such as new exclusions or a lower limit, an online insurer or broker that can't quote, a change in your activities, and contract demands your policy doesn't meet. In each case it helps to find out why it happened, present the risk fully and test the wider market. A specialist broker can often find a route, but alternative terms cannot be guaranteed.
Renewal increases usually come from the wider market hardening, a change in how insurers view your profession, or something specific to your firm, such as higher fees or a notification. Knowing which applies shapes the response.
Ask for the insurer's reasoning, check whether the limit, excess and wording changed too, and test other markets. Read what to do about a PI premium increase at renewal, why PI premiums rise at renewal and, if the jump is extreme, what to do if your PI premium has doubled.
A declinature is not always about you. Insurers regularly cut their appetite for a profession or leave a class altogether, catching firms with clean records. Other declines follow a claim, an unwanted type of work or an incomplete presentation.
Get the reason in writing, fill any information gaps and approach markets that actively write the risk. See PI declined or referred, getting PI after a declinature, what to do when an insurer exits the PI market and hard-to-place PI insurance.
Non-renewal is the most time-sensitive problem here: PI is written on a claims-made basis, so a gap in cover can leave earlier work exposed. Ask for renewal terms well before expiry.
If the refusal arrives late, prioritise keeping your retroactive date and notify any circumstances to the expiring policy. Read what to do if your insurer has non-renewed your policy, signs your PI insurer is exiting your class and the PI renewal timing playbook.
A claim or notified circumstance does not make a firm uninsurable, but underwriters will want to know what happened, the likely cost and what has changed since. A clear, factual account of each matter usually counts for more than the number of notifications.
Switching with an open matter needs care, as the notification normally stays with the policy it was made under. See PI insurance with prior claims, renewing after a claim or notification, switching PI broker when you have a claim and what a circumstance notification is.
Sometimes the price holds but the cover shrinks. A new exclusion, bigger excess, lower limit or a move from each-and-every-claim to aggregate can matter more than a price rise, and is easy to miss.
Compare the new schedule and wording with the expiring policy, and ask whether each change is negotiable. See what to check before you sign a PI renewal, comparing PI excess structures, is your PI limit still adequate and the prior known circumstances exclusion.
Online PI policies suit straightforward risks within set fee bands and activities. A firm that grows, takes larger contracts or adds riskier services can fall outside those rules. A generalist broker with few PI markets may hit the same wall.
This usually means the risk needs individual underwriting, not that it is uninsurable. See outgrowing your online PI policy, switching from a generalist to a specialist PI broker and whether switching broker affects your cover.
PI cover is written around the activities you described. If you add a service, enter a new sector or change your fee income significantly, the policy may not respond to the new work unless the insurer agrees it.
Tell your broker before the new work starts. Read PI when adding a service line, notifying a material change and what changes about PI as your firm grows.
Contracts often set a minimum limit, an each-and-every-claim basis, cover maintained for years after the work ends, or a retroactive date reaching back to earlier phases. Some ask for more than the market normally offers.
Check the clause before signing, then decide whether to buy more cover, add an excess layer or negotiate the wording. See when a contract requires a higher PI limit, my contract requires insurance, what a retroactive date is and our contract insurance clause check.
Under section 3 of the Insurance Act 2015, a business must make a fair presentation of the risk to the insurer before the contract is entered into. That means disclosing every material circumstance it knows or ought to know, or enough to put a prudent insurer on notice to ask more. A renewal is usually a new contract, so the duty applies each year.
A complete presentation often turns a decline into a quote. See fair presentation under the Insurance Act 2015 and non-disclosure vs misrepresentation.
The route for any of the problems above is a PI renewal second opinion. We usually need:
We will look for alternative terms and explain the options, but we cannot guarantee that alternative terms will be available: that depends on insurers' underwriting decisions.
Often, yes. One insurer's decline does not mean every insurer will say no, especially if the reason was appetite rather than your record. You will need to disclose the declinature and present the risk fully. Alternative terms cannot be guaranteed.
Act straight away. Ask for the reason in writing, notify any circumstances to the expiring policy and have a broker approach other markets. Keeping your retroactive date is usually a priority, because a gap in claims-made cover can leave past work exposed.
Yes. The Insurance Act 2015 requires businesses to make a fair presentation of the risk, which normally includes past claims, notified circumstances and previous declinatures. Leaving them out can give the insurer remedies if a claim is later made.
Normally not. A notified claim or circumstance generally stays with the policy it was notified under, whichever broker you use afterwards. Give the new broker full details so the matter is disclosed correctly to any new insurer.
It can be, especially after a sharp price rise, reduced cover or a decline. A second opinion compares your terms with what may be available elsewhere and checks the wording for changes. It may also confirm your current terms are reasonable.
Start the proposal online, or upload last year's proposal on the first page. Or call 0117 325 0027.
Start your proposal Request a callbackApex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Registered in England and Wales, company number 07014570. This page is general information, not advice on your individual circumstances, and it does not guarantee that cover will be available or on what terms.
