Professional indemnity broker · IT consultants · UK

Professional indemnity insurance broker for IT consultants

Technology professional indemnity for IT consultancies, managed service providers, software developers and SaaS companies — usually placed alongside cyber, and sized to the contracts your clients actually send you.

Part of: Professional indemnity insurance at Apex

Who this page is for

• IT consultancies, systems integrators and managed service providers.
• Software developers, SaaS and platform businesses, data and AI consultancies.
• Technology start-ups and scale-ups whose first enterprise contract or investor has just asked for PI and cyber.
• Firms with US or overseas clients, contractual liability caps to negotiate, or IP-infringement exposure.
• Firms that bought an online tech policy at launch and have outgrown it.

What technology PI has to do

The claim against a technology firm is almost never a simple negligence claim. It is a project that ran late and over budget, a system that did not do what the contract said, a data migration that lost records, or an outage at a client caused by your update. The policy needs to cover breach of contract as well as negligence, consequential loss where the contract allows it, IP infringement, and the cost of defending a claim in the jurisdiction your contract chose.

PI and cyber do different jobs. PI covers your professional error causing a client loss; cyber covers your own breach, ransomware or data-loss event and the costs that follow. Neither substitutes for the other, and the two are best placed together so nothing falls between them.

• Contract review before you sign. Client MSAs specify limits, basis of cover and sometimes named-insured requirements. We check them against the quote.
• Combined technology wording (tech PI, cyber and often public liability in one policy) removes the argument between two insurers about whose claim it is.
• IP infringement and media liability are frequently sub-limited or excluded; check before assuming.
• Subcontractors and offshore development must be declared, along with any US or Canadian clients.

What limit technology firms actually need

There is no regulator-set minimum for IT consultants; client contracts set it. A £1m limit is the standard advisory-consultancy default and fits most small IT consultancy firms with fee income up to around £500k. £2m to £5m suits delivery and integration consultancy, mid-size firms, projects over £100k in value and public-sector contracts. Most client contracts — particularly public-sector and large-corporate — require £1m to £10m of PI as a contractual condition.

If a contract asks for more than you hold, tell us before you sign. An increase mid-term is routine; discovering the gap at claim time is not.

How Apex places professional indemnity for IT consultants

• A short fact-find, not a 40-question form. We ask about your work as IT consultancies, software developers and technology companies: what you do, who for, fee income, staff, contracts, claims and anything unusual.
• A written presentation to insurers. Under the Insurance Act 2015 you have a duty of fair presentation. We help you meet it — and a well-presented risk gets better terms than a bare proposal form.
• Quotes set out to compare. Usually three or four, with limits, excesses, retroactive dates, exclusions and premium side by side, and our recommendation in plain English.
• No gap in cover. If you are moving from another broker, insurer or scheme, we put the new policy in place before the old one lapses and check the retroactive date protects your past work.
• The same person afterwards. Mid-term changes, contract queries, certificates for clients, circumstance notifications and next year’s renewal all go through your named broker.

Why IT consultants move their PI to Apex

• Owned by its directors, not for sale. No consolidator, no private-equity owner, no external shareholders — and we have declined approaches to buy the firm. Read the Apex Independence Charter.
• Independent, not tied. No single-insurer scheme, no in-house policy, no placement quotas — the recommendation is the one that fits, not the one we are paid to push.
• Over 30 markets, including Lloyd’s. Specialist UK PI insurers and Lloyd’s syndicates via wholesale, so a risk that one underwriter dislikes can still be placed properly with another.
• Usually three or four competing quotes, laid out side by side — limit, excess, retroactive date, exclusions and premium — with a plain-language note on the trade-offs.
• The stay-put letter. If your existing cover is right, we say so in writing, free and without obligation. How the stay-put letter works.
• A named broker all year. The person who places your cover is the person who picks up the phone at renewal, on a mid-term change, or when a letter of claim lands.
• Director-level attention on claims. We help you notify circumstances early and in the right form, stay involved once the insurer’s panel solicitors are appointed, and tell you plainly where you stand.
• Directly authorised by the FCA since 2016, not an appointed representative trading under someone else’s permissions.

When it is worth getting a second quote

• You have outgrown a professional-body or adviser-network scheme, or an online-only policy, and nobody has re-marketed your risk in years.
• A client, lender, framework or regulator now requires a higher limit, a different basis of cover, or evidence your existing broker cannot produce quickly.
• Your insurer has non-renewed, withdrawn from your profession, or imposed an exclusion you were not warned about.
• Your renewal rose sharply with no explanation, or the person who knew your firm has left, retired, or been absorbed into a consolidator.
• You have a claim, a circumstance, a CCJ or something else non-standard, and your current arrangement treats it as a tick-box decline.
• Your broker has been bought by a consolidator or a global broker and the independence you chose them for has gone.

None of these needs a falling-out with your current broker. Send us the renewal, we tell you plainly whether you are well placed. If you are, we say so. How switching broker works without a gap in cover →

When we are not the right broker

• You want the cheapest possible policy bought online in five minutes with no conversation. An online-only product may suit you better, and we would rather say so than waste your time.
• Your regulator or professional body requires you to use one specific scheme with no alternative. That is rare, but where it applies we will tell you.
• You are outside the UK, or your firm is effectively a US-domiciled business with a UK office.

Related guides

• Get a professional indemnity insurance quote
• Best professional indemnity insurance in the UK: how to choose
• IT consultants professional indemnity insurance — the full UK guide
• How much professional indemnity insurance do you need?
• What professional indemnity insurance costs, and what drives the premium
• Professional indemnity insurance at Apex
• When to switch business insurance broker
• Non-standard professional indemnity: CCJs, claims, declines, adverse credit
• The Apex Independence Charter: owned by its directors, not for sale
• PI minimum limit calculator: what your regulator requires
• UK PI brokers: who has been bought, and who is still independent
• Combined technology insurance: tech PI and cyber in one policy
• Technology professional indemnity insurance
• Is cyber insurance a legal requirement in the UK?
• Insurance for start-ups and scale-ups

Frequently asked

Apex 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 about professional indemnity insurance, not advice on your individual circumstances, and it does not guarantee that cover will be available or on what terms.