Lawyers’ professional liability insurance provides coverage on a “claims made and reported” basis. To have coverage, the attorney must have a policy in effect when the claim is first made and report it to the carrier during the policy period. Generally, claims made and reported coverage will not apply for claims arising during a period when the attorney did not have any insurance in effect, even if reported during a current policy period. This is different from “occurrence” coverage, which provides coverage if there was a policy in effect at the date of the occurrence regardless of when reported.
It is also important to know about “prior acts” coverage. The “retro” or “prior acts” date gives the date before which or between which coverage will not apply on the current policy. Sometimes it may seem less expensive to not have prior acts coverage, but that would mean there would not be coverage for an act, error or omission that occurred before the effective date of that policy. Discussion of these dates should be given very careful consideration.
To learn more about a claims-made and reported lawyers professional liability policy, contact Ohio Bar Liability Insurance Company. Gretchen Mote, J.D., Director of Loss Prevention, or any of OBLIC’s Underwriters will be happy to answer your questions.
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