Policy Features
Literary Agents are representatives of authors and assist in negotiations with publishers. Professional indemnity insurance for Literary Agents is designed to protect Literary Agents from claims made against them by their clients.
Why do Literary Agents require Professional Indemnity Insurance?
Authors often turn to Literary Agents for several reasons. The general responsibilities and duties of Literary Agents include the following:
- Representing authors in the publishing world
- Managing the business aspect of publishing for authors
- Reading and reviewing a large number of manuscripts to decide which authors to represent
- Negotiating contracts regarding publishing rights, advances and royalties
- Suggesting edits that can improve the manuscripts before marketing
- Communicating with authors about any significant changes publishers request in manuscripts
- Assisting authors in understanding the ins and outs of publishing
- Using their publishing connections to reach key editors
A Literary Agent has to perform all of the above mentioned duties with reasonable care or he/she might face legal action. Professional Indemnity Insurance provides them with financial protection to assist in defending claims and paying any resultant damages.
Public Liability Insurance for Literary Agents
If you or any of your employees visit a customers premises your actions could cause an injury to another person. Similarly, if an accident happens whilst a member of the public comes to your place of business and they are injured you could be held liable. Public Liability Insurance protects you in the event that such accidents occur and a claim is subsequently made against you.
Public liability insurance also covers you if damage is caused to third party property while at the customers business. An example would be if an employee broke a valuable item while making a delivery at a customer's home. The claim to replace the item would be covered by public liability insurance.
Key exposures for Literary Agents:
- Failure to submit a project to prospective buyers.
- Failure to negotiate an acceptable contract.
- Negligence in evaluation of a book's quality and potential.
- Negligence in guidance of an author regarding his literary career.
- Loss of potential income or royalties due to poor representation and books not being published or badly marketed.
- Actions in relation to breach of copyright, intellectual property, plagiarism, libel and slander.
- Issues in relation to material being released via the internet virally before publication resulting in loss of income and/or piracy.
Why purchase your Professional Indemnity Insurance through Express Insurance?
With Express Insurance, you can source a PI quote in seconds, and have the option of adding Public Liability Insurance. You can then proceed to buy the insurance and produce your Certificate of Insurance in minutes, or alternatively save the quote back to your email account for buying later.
And we save your details on Renewal of your insurance, making the process of renewing your PI Insurance even easier and quicker.
Throughout your experience with us our team of highly experienced PI specialists are a phone call away!
Please Note: Coverage under the policy will be subject to the particular circumstances relating to a claim and the full terms and conditions of the policy.
Policy Features
Price
PI premiums are determined by your Turnover and PL Premiums by the number of staff under your employ. All insurers charge a minimum premium in both respects.
We believe we have negotiated highly competitive premiums for both classes of insurance, and will continue to monitor premium levels available in the market to ensure this remains the case.
Purpose
From a compliance perspective and for your own protection you should have a minimum level of Professional Indemnity(PI) insurance. In the event that the services you provide for a client lead to a claim against that client they will generally look at claiming against the provider. PI insurance will protect you in the event that this occurs.
Convenience
We have designed the Insurance application process so it only takes an average of 5 minutes to complete your application. In most cases your application will be instantly approved online, and you can print your Confirmation of Insurance to prove that you have the requisite cover in place... It's that easy!! All other documentation, such as your tax invoice, policy schedule and wording will be emailed directly to you for your records.
If the policy can't be issued immediately because we require further information, we will contact you generally on the same day.
Renewal
Approximately one month prior to the renewal of your policy you will receive a renewal reminder email with a link that will allow you to review your previous years cover and renew the policy even quicker!
* We have minimized the number of referral situations so that most applications will be automatically accepted. However, if for example you have prior claims we will contact you to facilitate completion of your application personally with the Insurer.
Insurer
Your Insurance policy is arranged by Express Insurance acting as an agent of Berkley Insurance Australia, a registered business name of Berkley Insurance Company (ABN 53 126 559 706) and part of the W.R.Berkley Corporation.
Berkley Insurance Australia underwrites a significant portfolio of general insurance business in Australia. They are fully authorised and regulated by the Australian Prudential Regulator Authority (APRA) which is the prudential regulator of the Australian financial services industry.
The financial strength rating of Berkley Insurance Australia is "A+ (Strong)" by Standard & Poor's.
Charitable Contribution
For each policy completed online we make a donation to Skin & Cancer Foundation.
About Skin & Cancer Foundation
The Skin & Cancer Foundation Inc is a not-for-profit, DGR registered, organisation which provides specialist treatment, education and research for a wide variety of skin disorders, skin cancers and melanomas.
Lodge a Claim
We will work with you to ensure that claims are handled in a professional manner and that you get a fair outcome from the Insurer. The first step is to lodge your claim as outlined below.
Please complete the claim form and email to australia@wrberkley.com
