On Sep 20, 2011, at 8:15 AM, Jack Morgan wrote:
Randy,
On 09/20/2011 08:10 AM, Randy Carpenter wrote:
----- Original Message -----
On Tue, 20 Sep 2011 07:59:00 EDT, harbor235 said:
Curious if anyone out there is acting as an independent contractor, consultant, or small business, if so do you use professional liability insurance?
I don't consult myself, but is *anybody* crazy enough to do consulting in the litigation-crazy US without carrying errors-and-omissions insurance?
The reality is that with the mega-insurance companies able to set whatever crazy premiums they feel like, and raise them every other month, the cost of being fully insured is sometimes more than what you can charge as a consultant.
This is just not true. Insurance companies are regulated by State Insurance boards. If an insurance company wants to raise rates, they have to submit a proposal to the their state insurance board. They can only raise rates for a "class" of customers. For example, all customers aged 50 - 62.
This is generally NOT true for E&O and Professional liability insurance. For the most part, that goes largely unregulated. The state insurance boards tend to focus on consumer-oriented forms of insurance (auto, home, life). Owen