I have been a risk manager here at ALPS for well over two decades now, which helps explain why I personally view the purchase of legal malpractice insurance as a necessary expense. Trust me, I know firsthand. Having to face the fallout of a malpractice misstep while uninsured is something I would never wish upon [...]
Just as with small businesses in every sector, small law firms have widely varying outcomes in terms of business longevity. Over the years, I’ve worked with a few small firms that have been in existence for decades and others that have come and gone in a few short years. For most small firms, regardless of [...]
More than a few lawyers who exclusively practice in the mediation or criminal defense space believe that purchasing malpractice insurance is a waste of money. The justifications lawyer mediators typically rely on are that they have quasi-judicial immunity as a defense and/or in most situations, the allegations of malpractice are baseless. The justification criminal defense [...]
Two calls that I recently took almost back to back really surprised me. The first came from an attorney who was retiring in another month or so. He had a few general malpractice insurance questions. The second was from an associate attorney with a small firm that was on the verge of dissolving. This associate [...]
Prior Acts Coverage With the short history lesson of Part 1 behind us, we can now start to dig into the basics of malpractice insurance. In order to do so, we need to first understand what coverage for prior acts actually is. Let me start by defining the term “retroactive coverage date.” The retroactive coverage [...]
As a risk manager for a legal malpractice insurer, I suspect many of you reading this could venture a good guess as to what my answer to the above question would be for most law firms, regardless of size; but note that the question is asking if it is always a good business decision. That’s [...]
I suspect having to deal with an allegation of malpractice isn’t something anyone would put on a list of “things I look forward to" for all kinds of reasons, not the least of which is the emotional roller coaster so many experience throughout the life of a claim. Of course, once the claims reporting process [...]
An attorney’s decision to use a computer tablet, a cloud based service such as Dropbox, a smart phone, a Wi-Fi network, or even basic email in the furtherance of delivering legal services is not in and of itself unethical nor a poor business decision. The real concern is with what the attorneys who use such [...]
I have yet to read an insurance policy that I would consider a great read. So let’s admit it, insurance policies are rather boring. I suspect few of you have ever really taken the time to read completely through your homeowners or auto policy. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with this as long as your various [...]
Malpractice Insurance Claims made vs. Occurrence-based Coverage Before digging into the basics of legal malpractice insurance, I’m going to share a little insurance history in order to set the stage. Prior to the 1970’s, legal malpractice policies were occurrence-based, which meant that if a malpractice policy was in force during the time the alleged malpractice [...]
