Professional Liability Insurance Winnipeg

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Professional Liability Insurance

As a professional, you’re trusted to deliver sound advice, excellent workpersonship, top-notch medical care, or other services. When you fail to meet the standards of your profession, your negligence causes physical or financial damage, or errors you make lead to unnecessary suffering, you may be sued.

Professional liability insurance, also known as errors & omissions (E&O) insurance (for most professionals) or malpractice insurance (for medical professionals) is a key part of a comprehensive insurance plan for any professional. Here’s how it works:

Professional Liability Insurance Coverage

Professional liability insurance covers you for negligence, errors, omissions, and other failures to deliver agreed-upon services. There are many layers to professional liability insurance, but in general, if you provide a service or advice to a person in exchange for money, you need professional liability insurance coverage.

Your professional liability insurance policy may cover many different things—typically, professional liability insurance covers legal costs associated with errors and negligence, including:

  • Your legal team’s fees
  • Costs associated with filing documents, collecting evidence, and more
  • The costs of court judgements

In short, a professional liability policy protects professionals who make errors or perform negligent acts from the costs of being sued for those actions. 

Media Implications

One of the layers of liability insurance is media—more specifically, slander or libel. Imagine you research a competitor for a client and your research is provably false, but your client spreads that information in the media—they may be found liable for defamation, and then sue you in return for the bad information that caused the lawsuit. Alternatively, as an advertiser, you might put out slanderous or libellous materials that your client gets sued for—again, they may sue you in return. Using materials without expressed permission from the copyright holder can also lead to lawsuits for your clients—and you. Errors and omissions insurance can help protect you.

Professional Negligence

Professional negligence is a broad term. Injuries to a client as a personal trainer or injuries to a patient as a medical professional both fall under this umbrella if you’ve failed to consider your patient or client’s health. A lawyer failing to file court documents in a timely manner, an accountant making mistakes that lead to tax penalties, an insurance agent who fails to provide adequate coverage to a client—all of these can be considered professional negligence.

Defective Products

When a product you consulted or worked on doesn’t work properly, you may be sued—this can be a digital product, like an app or a physical product, like a tool. This coverage is different from product liability insurance, however, which covers manufacturers and other stakeholders if the products they develop cause property damage, injury, or other losses. 

Cost Of Professional Liability Insurance

Professional liability insurance costs vary dramatically depending on a number of different factors, including the professional services you offer, your experience in the industry, the size of your business, and more.

Risk Level

Surgeons, doctors, dentists, orthodontists, lawyers, architects, and engineers typically have the highest costs. Coverage for IT consultants, financial advisors, and others will be lower. Consultants, coaches, and web designers will see even lower costs, and writers, editors, photographers, and other creatives will see the lowest costs.This isn’t an exhaustive list of professional services, but you get the idea—the more costly your potential mistakes are, the more costly your professional liability insurance will be. In the same vein, the more likely you are to make mistakes, the riskier you are as a client. Insurers will often offer discounts to professionals with a lot of experience in their industry. On the flip side, professionals who have made several liability claims will see their premiums skyrocket. 

Business Revenue

Higher revenue typically means some combination of three things: More clients, higher value projects, and more money to go after in a lawsuit if something goes wrong. More clients mean a bigger chance of something going wrong (it’s a numbers game), and higher value projects mean more at stake when something goes wrong. For these reasons, higher revenue means a higher cost for your professional liability insurance. 

Number Of Employees

Your insurer can look at your experience when assessing the risk of offering your professional liability insurance—but what about your employees? It’s likely you’re offloading some of your work to your employees—but you’re still responsible for the errors they make; the more employees you have, the more your liability insurance will cost. 

Avoiding Professional Liability Insurance Claims

While professional liability insurance can help cover legal fees and protect you in the case of errors and negligence, the best way of lowering your insurance premiums and reducing your overall costs is to stay claims-free. You can do this by:

  • Carefully reviewing your hiring and training processes
  • Ensuring that contracts and communications with clients are clear and precise
  • Avoiding overworking or working when tired, stressed, sick, or otherwise compromised
  • Hiring more professionals when you’ve reached your limit

Even the most diligent professionals can make mistakes occasionally, and that’s why every professional should have coverage. If you’re looking for a professional liability insurance policy in Winnipeg, contact us today. 

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Frequently Asked Questions

Professionals who are at risk of being sued for negligence and errors should consider professional liability insurance—and that includes almost anyone who provides a service in exchange for money. Some professionals carry lower risk; it’s important to consider your unique situation and talk to your insurance broker to understand if professional liability insurance is right for you.

Professionals who are at risk of being sued for negligence and errors should consider professional liability insurance—and that includes almost anyone who provides a service in exchange for money. Some professionals carry lower risk; it’s important to consider your unique situation and talk to your insurance broker to understand if professional liability insurance is right for you.

Yes. Errors and omissions insurance and professional liability insurance are the same thing. It’s also called medical malpractice insurance for medical professionals.

Public liability insurance (PLI) protects businesses from third-party claims for injuries or property damage caused by business operations. Slip-and-fall accidents that occur on your property are a good example of what’s covered by PLI. Professional liability insurance (the other PLI), on the other hand, covers errors and negligence by professionals offering services.

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