Request from our Client:
Need to add a temporary increased limits ‘rider’ to my Attorney Malpractice Insurance Policy to cover a large real estate deal for a client.
Response:
The term “rider” is normally associated with life and health insurance policies. For property & casualty policies you add endorsements to policies, but on the request.
Attorney malpractice policies are written on a ‘claims-made’ policy form. With a claims-made policy, when a claim is made, you settle using the policy form in force at the time the claim is made. Not the coverage that may have been inforce when the act occurred. Once the policy is endorsed for the increased limits, you need to maintain those limits until the statute of limitations has run to be assured that you have the proper coverage in place. There is no ‘temporary’ endorsement that can be added to accomplish this.
The other alternative might be to purchase an additional policy to cover this. But insurers normally will not issue an attorney malpractice policy for just one client. Even if you can find an insurer willing to do this, the problem again being claims-made requires maintaining the limits until the statue runs or purchasing an Extended Reporting Period Endorsement (ERP) for this policy.