Society wins support for single indemnity proposal form

The Law Society has said it has won support from “some of the major names” in indemnity insurance for a single, common application form for law firms.

A spokesman for the society said the brokers included Aon and Marsh, who reserved the right to ask further questions, along with Prime Professions, Wesleyan and Windsor.

Des Hudson, chief executive of the society, said a common proposal form would make it easier for members to obtain quotations from different insurers.

“The need to fill in the same or similar information about the firm to satisfy the requirements of different insurers seems unnecessarily time-consuming and extremely frustrating,” he said.

“The experience of solicitors in Ireland (a market populated by many of the insurers active in our market) last year, where the common proposal form helped solicitors get better value premiums, has reaffirmed our determination to help our members by the introduction of a common proposal form.”

The society said it was urging other brokers and insurers to sign up to the new form and encouraging solicitors to ask their broker and insurers to accept the common form.

In a letter to solicitors sent yesterday, Hudson said the common form had a “sufficient degree of commonality that it should be broadly acceptable to qualifying insurers with minimal supplementary questions, if any”.

The letter said the society had written to all qualifying insurers and major brokers within the market to ask for an indication as to whether or not they will accept the form.

Hudson finished by reminding solicitors that the profession had “witnessed the power of the profession when it adopts a common theme and works to achieve it in our recent experience with HSBC”.