Professional Indemnity Insurance - Understanding your legal expenses policy
At Numark we are always on hand to help you with expert advice in any aspect of running a pharmacy. For insurance advice we partner with Tasker Insurance Brokers, which provide a portfolio of insurance products suitable both for your pharmacy business and for you as an individual.
At the core of this is their Professional Indemnity insurance (PI) cover which is an essential part of working as a pharmacist as it protects you and your business against potentially financially damaging claims.
Many of you who have arranged professional indemnity insurance through Numark Insurance Services will have discovered that an increasingly useful part of this cover is the integral legal expenses policy.
With all the pressures that come with operating an effective pharmacy business in the extremely challenging current climate, it’s easy to find yourself falling foul of one of an ever-increasing number of regulatory or statutory requirements. Whilst your professional indemnity policy can cover you in the event of dispensing an incorrect drug, you may find yourself needing help or advice around other legal issues; and this is where your legal expenses policy can help.
Who is the insurer?
Your Essential Business Legal expenses policy is provided by Arag plc, a provider of before and after the event legal insurance products and assistance for both businesses and individuals. More information can be found at www.arag.co.uk.
What does the legal expenses policy cover?
The policy provides for legal costs and expenses cover, as well as advice around a wide range of exposures including, legal and regulatory investigation (includes fitness to practise), breach of contract and debt recovery, personal injury, identity theft, tax disputes and Employment disputes and awards, up to certain limits, as specified in your policy.*
Support and Advice
As part of the cover, you have access to specialist telephone advice lines to answer your legal questions and provide advice and guidance to help avoid problems escalating. Within your policy you will find contact numbers for a legal and tax advice line, an identity theft resolution line, crisis communication and counselling helplines.
In addition, you have access to a business legal services web portal where you can discover more about legal matters, including taking a legal health-check, and are able to create documents and letters to help with commercial legal matters. Many of the templates you will find are free to download.
The contact numbers for all these helplines along with the business legal services website details can be found on page 2 of your Arag legal expenses policy.
How do I get help with employment issues?
For many, a potential employment dispute can be one of the most difficult and time-consuming challenges to deal with. Certainly, Arag tell us the majority of calls the legal advice line receives involve employment related queries, and it is very important to understand how the cover works in order to make the most of it.
The Business legal and tax advice helpline is staffed by qualified legal advisers and is there to assist with your questions and provide advice around employment law issues. They operate independently of your insurers and therefore the help and advice they give is based solely on the merits of the information you provide, so it is always important to provide as much information as possible. We recommend calling the advice line to discuss any likely issues as early as possible to help avoid problems getting worse.
If I am taken to a tribunal, how does my insurance policy help me?
Cover for employment tribunals is provided under your policy if, based on independent legal advice, there is a greater chance of Arag successfully defending the tribunal claim than not (this is sometime referred to as an expectation of success clause). Again, the advice around the likely expectation of success is provided by independent legal sources. However, unlike some other legal expenses policies or services, where the case is defended, the Arag policy will cover both employment tribunal cost and awards should the case be unexpectedly lost. This would be subject to the limits of indemnity contained on your policy schedule.
What if I want a more personalised HR service?
If you should decide that your business requires a more interactive and in-depth level of HR support, then there is an option through Numark. As an approved supplier to Numark members,Citation can provide a tailored solution for you that includes document preparation and checking along with tribunal support.
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*Please see policy for full range of benefits, limits of cover and terms and conditions. A full policy wording is available upon request.
Phoenix Healthcare Distribution Ltd (Numark) is an Introducer Appointed Representative of Tasker Insurance Brokers Ltd. Numark Insurance Services is a trading name of Tasker Insurance Brokers Limited which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Registered in England and Wales. Our company registration number is 08284692. Our registered office is Beaufort House, 15 St. Botolph Street, London EC3A 7BB.