The fact that every lawyer is obliged by professional law to take out professional liability insurance in accordance with § 51 BRAO and to maintain this insurance for the entire duration of his admission to the bar is known to every professional at the latest at the time of applying for admission to the bar.
However, the professional regulation exclusively provides that each lawyer must be insured for at least 250,000 euros for each insured event.
This minimum insurance sum will regularly provide sufficient cover for their professional risk for many people starting out in their careers. Often, however, both a lawyer’s practice areas and client structures can change.
The changes affecting the liability risk occur with other professionals. In practice, the dangers of an insufficient sum insured can therefore arise insidiously and initially unrecognised. In addition, the issue of individual liability risk is not infrequently suppressed by the professional.
The three authors, who are experienced in the field of liability and insurance law and who address the possible gaps in coverage in pecuniary loss liability insurance, aim to raise awareness of this important topic with their work, which is written for lawyers, tax advisors and auditors, and therefore reflects typical – but avoidable – sources of error and atypical activities with the usual standard coverages of the insurers.
This is intended to make the reader clearly aware of often overlooked gaps or exclusions in insurance cover, for example in connection with the so-called “knowing breach of duty”.
In their work, the authors not only present related areas of private and professional insurance protection, but also very clearly illustrate possible strategies for limiting liability.
In addition to the individual limitation of compensation claims possible under § 51a BRAO, the topic of “risk management” is also dealt with.
Every lawyer can only be strongly recommended – for example with the help of this work – to investigate the question of whether his individual insurance cover is adequate.
by courtesy of
www.brak-mitteilungen.de (BRAK Mitteilungen 04/2010, 160-161)
