As an engineer, you likely already have some form of insurance. However, one type of insurance you may not have considered is professional indemnity cover.
Designed to protect you in the event of a claim being made against your business, this type of insurance can prevent you from losing your company if anything does go wrong. When you look at it like that, you realise exactly how important it can be! So what benefits, besides preventing you from losing your business, does professional indemnity insurance provide?
How professional indemnity insurance can help
Engineers are required to have extensive, in-depth knowledge and skills to carry out complex tasks. The role of the engineer is an important one and the work you carry out makes a massive difference to your customers and clients. Therefore, if something does go wrong and you are held responsible, the consequences are a lot more severe than they would be in some other industries.
You may not even realise the sheer number of things that could go wrong that professional indemnity insurance could protect you from. Just some of the things you can expect to be covered when you take out this type of insurance include:
- Asbestos cover
- Defamation, slander and libel
- Joint venture/consortium protection
- Civil liability cover
- Public relations expenses
- Court attendance compensation
- Loss or damage of data
These are just a small number of things professional indemnity insurance provides. If you do face legal action, it isn’t just the fine you’re ordered to pay to the claimant that can cripple you. There’s also the numerous legal fees involved, as well as the time you’ll need to take off work to attend court hearings. It soon adds up and without insurance you may soon find yourself out of pocket.
Do you need it?
Whilst engineering work does offer a pretty good salary, it’s doubtful even the highest paid engineer would be able to cover all of the costs involved with a claim. You may also think that your many years of experience and the fact you’ve never had an issue, would prove you don’t really need to be insured. However, regardless of how skilled you are mistakes can happen. Would you be able to afford all of the legal fees if you did make a mistake? If not, having professional indemnity insurance is a safe option.
Overall, it’s always better to be safe than sorry. You work really hard to build up and run your business, so why risk it by failing to be adequately insured?