No matter the occupation, says Barb Pattenden, Director of Insurance Operations for South Western Insurance Group Limited, if your client needs professional liability protection, you have come to the right place. “SWG is really good at protecting most types of clients with Errors & Omissions exposure because we have been doing it for such a long time.” South Western Insurance Group Limited’s underwriters are particularly experienced at meeting the liability coverage needs of the following groups:
- Architects and engineers,
- Insurance brokers and agents,
- Media personnel,
- IT professionals, and
- Various types of consultants
The company even offers an exclusive Professional Liability & Commercial General Liability combined product that caters directly to architect and engineer clients, as well as to a host of miscellaneous risk categories like bookkeepers and translators. Media and information technology exposures are especially prevalent in today’s digitally driven professional landscape, Pattenden adds, so the company’s Multimedia Liability insurance was designed to protect against claims related to everything from invasion of privacy, to copyright infringement, to E&O arising from media content generation. “We are actually working with a great new market for our media-related coverage that allows us to effectively insure broadcasters, advertising agencies, publishers, and public relations companies among many others.” Meanwhile, the company’s IT-related E&O coverage is available to professionals ranging from web page developers and data processors, to hardware and software providers. But while this handful of the more common risk groupings forms the core of South Western Insurance Group Limited’s professional liability business, it by no means represents the limit of who they can help. The company’s coverage offerings extend to a wide range of miscellaneous professions that literally stretch from A to Z – or “from accident investigators to zoologists”, as Pattenden puts it. “Arbitrators, convention planners, genealogists, interpreters, payroll service professionals, placement agencies, telephone answering services, tree surgeons — nine times out of ten,” she affirms, “if a client has E&O exposure, we can provide coverage for that. And while I do not believe I have ever actually seen an application for a zoologist in my thirty years working in the professional liability space, should that day ever come, SWG can definitely quote it!” Diversity of risk aside, Pattenden emphasizes that the biggest advantage for brokers working with South Western Insurance Group Limited for their E&O needs lies in the company’s substantial expertise. “There is a tremendous depth of knowledge here in our professional liability department, with most of our personnel laying claim to many years – often decades – of relevant experience. In fact, we often hear from our brokers how much they love dealing with SWG’s underwriters because of the service they receive and the product knowledge we offer. Of course it also goes without saying that, having served as an integral part of the Canadian insurance industry for more than half a century, our clients cannot help but benefit from of our long-standing market relations.”
