Eight Questions to Ask Any Professional Indemnity Broker

Before you appoint a PI broker, ask these eight questions. A good broker will welcome every one of them — and the answers will tell you who you are dealing with.

Appointing a professional indemnity broker is a professional-services purchase like any other: the quality of the outcome depends on the quality of the questions you ask before you commit. The eight questions below are the ones we would ask in your position. None of them is a trick, and a good broker will welcome all of them. For each, we have set out why it matters and what a good answer sounds like.

1. Which insurers can you actually access for my profession?

Why it matters: “independent” and “whole-of-market” mean little until you know which markets will genuinely see your risk. Some brokers place business across the open market; others work mainly from a panel or a small number of facilities. Neither is wrong, but you should know which you are buying.

A good answer names the kinds of insurers and markets relevant to your profession, explains where their access comes from, and is honest about any limitations. Vague answers — “we deal with everyone” with no specifics — deserve a follow-up question.

2. How much professional indemnity business do you place, and for whom?

Why it matters: PI is a wording-driven class where market knowledge decays quickly. A broker who places PI occasionally, as a sideline to general commercial business, will not have the same feel for current appetite and wording differences as one who does it constantly.

A good answer describes the professions they act for, roughly how much of their business is PI, and ideally includes firms that look like yours. You are listening for pattern recognition: do they already know the issues your profession faces, or will they be learning on your file?

3. Who will handle my account day to day — and who handles it when something goes wrong?

Why it matters: the person who wins your business is not always the person who services it. And the moment you most need your broker is a notification, not a renewal.

A good answer names an actual person, describes their experience, and explains how claims and circumstances are handled — whether there is dedicated claims support, who advocates for you with the insurer, and what their role is if coverage is disputed. If claims handling is an afterthought in the answer, treat that as information.

4. How will you present my risk to insurers?

Why it matters: the terms you get back reflect the quality of the submission that went out. A bare proposal form invites cautious pricing; a well-constructed presentation of your activities, risk management and claims record invites competition.

A good answer describes a process: time spent understanding your firm, a written submission or market presentation, a deliberate choice of which insurers to approach and why, and feedback to you on how the market responded. Ask to see an example submission format. A broker proud of their process will show you.

5. How are you remunerated on my policy?

Why it matters: brokers are generally paid by commission from the insurer, by a fee agreed with you, or a combination. No model is inherently better, but transparency is non-negotiable, and you are entitled to ask.

A good answer is immediate and plain: how they are paid on your placement, and what happens if that changes. Hesitation or generalities here are a poor sign in someone whose job is to be candid with you about documents far more complicated than their own invoice.

6. What will you check in the wording before recommending a quote?

Why it matters: this question separates brokers who compare premiums from brokers who compare policies. The value of specialist advice lives in the details: the definition of your activities, the basis of the limit, the excess structure and what it applies to, the retroactive date, exclusions relevant to your work, and any conditions your contracts require the policy to meet.

A good answer walks through exactly those points unprompted and relates them to your firm — for instance, asking what your client contracts require before recommending a limit basis. If you mention a specific contractual insurance clause and the broker offers to review it against the wording, you are talking to the right kind of firm.

7. How will you handle my retroactive cover and continuity if I move to you?

Why it matters: PI is written on a claims-made basis, so continuity is everything. Moving broker or insurer carelessly can create gaps — a lost retroactive date, an unnotified circumstance falling between policies — that only surface when a claim arrives years later.

A good answer explains, without prompting, how they preserve your retroactive date on a change of insurer, why circumstances must be notified to the outgoing policy before expiry, and how they manage run-off situations if your firm ever restructures or closes. A broker who treats continuity as a formality has not done enough claims-made work.

8. Are you authorised, and what happens if I have a complaint?

Why it matters: arranging insurance in the UK is a regulated activity. You should know who regulates the firm, be able to verify it on the public register, and understand the complaints route if the relationship goes wrong.

A good answer gives you the firm's authorisation details and reference number without fuss and explains their complaints process. Checking the register takes two minutes and is worth doing for any intermediary you are about to trust with your firm's largest liability protection. For the record: Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority under FRN 724952, and we would expect you to check.

What to do with the answers

You are not scoring these questions out of ten. You are listening for three things across the whole conversation: specificity (real insurers, real processes, real names), candour (especially on remuneration and on what they cannot do), and whether the broker asks you good questions in return. A broker who wants to understand your contracts and activities before talking about price is showing you how they will behave for the rest of the relationship. A broker who leads with a cheap premium and glosses over the wording is doing the same.

Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN 724952).