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What is ICT Insurance?

Professional Indemnity Insurance Professional Services Insurance Technology Sector Insurance IT Consultants Insurance

Are you an IT professional? Your basic public and products liability insurance is not going to cut it in your arena. By providing professional advice and services or products for a fee and designing systems and programs to achieve certain outcomes for your clients, you have a significant and unique Professional Indemnity exposure.

An ICT Insurance Policy is designed specifically for the advice, products and services an IT consultant will offer in their business by combining Professional Indemnity with Public and Products Liability under one policy wording, and removes any ambiguity in whether you’re providing a product or a service with your software advice for example, or your system design.

What does an ICT Insurance policy cover?

These policies have two sections - your Public and Products liability section, a Professional Indemnity section. You can usually select a sub-limit from $10mil and up for public and products liability and $1mil and up for the Professional Indemnity section. Excesses vary from insurer to insurer however they are often as low as $500.

The Public and Products liability section covers your business for property damage and injury to third parties as a result of negligence in the course of providing your business or the use of your products.

The Professional Indemnity section covers you for financial loss as a result of errors and omissions or breaches of your professional duty and services, as well as legal defence and compensation costs.

Why do I need a special IT policy?

Traditionally non-IT Professional Indemnity policies (think a standard consultants policy) define an IT service as a product rather than a service, and products are not covered under these policies. This can lead to arguments between public liability insurers and professional indemnity insurers as to who bears the loss, especially considering public liability (or the products liability in this case) is only for property damage not financial loss.

By combining these two covers under one Policy Wording, insurers are simplifying the ‘who pays for what’ argument and the Insured has peace of mind that their claim, if accepted, will be paid.

ICT Insurance is becoming more mainstream, with more insurers starting to offer policies, so there is a fair bit of market scope out there. Working with a broker to understand your business and service provision, is the best way to ensure you’re getting a policy that covers all aspects of your exposures best. Get in touch today to discuss your IT business.

General Advice Warning: This advice is general and does not take into account your objectives, financial situation or needs. You should consider whether the advice is appropriate for you and your personal circumstances. Before you make any decision about whether to acquire a certain product, you should obtain and read the relevant product disclosure statement.

All information above has been provided by the author.

Laura Meyer, MeyerInsure, ABN 87 340 928 486, AFSL 233750

This article originally appeared on MeyerInsure - Blog and has been published here with permission.