Construction Leadership Council announces review of growing PI insurance crisis

In recent years, firms from across the industry have reported sharp increases in premiums for PI insurance, while also seeing stricter curbs on the levels of cover. Some firms have reported four-fold increases in policy costs, while others have stated that that they can no longer secure cover.

This situation has been driven by a multitude of factors including a response to higher historic claims from the sector, as well as a cyclical hardening of the insurance market.

The Construction Leadership Council is planning steps to relieve the crisis. This includes developing a robust evidence base, identifying in detail the areas where the industry is facing the most significant difficulties.

The organisation is asking companies to provide confidential feedback on the costs and policy exclusions that they’ve experienced when renewing their cover. The survey is entirely confidential, but firms are asked to indicate their type of business in order to help target any future support on those areas of greatest need.

Second crisis

Samantha Peat, lead for the Construction Leadership Council’s Professional Indemnity Insurance Group, said: “The COVID-19 pandemic has dominated headlines for the last year, but there’s undoubtedly a second crisis that has been quietly growing for businesses across our industry.”

Peat continued: “We’re speaking to the Government and insurers to find ways in which to help businesses that could otherwise face an uncertain future due to the nature of their PI renewals. We want businesses from across the industry to give us their views, whether or not they’re directly affected, in order to help us shape the way in which we prepare a response from the whole sector.”

Construction Leadership Council chair Andy Mitchell added: “We’ve seen in the last year that our industry can deliver real positive change when we work together to tackle shared challenges. Given the feedback from across construction about the difficulties faced by companies, we strongly encourage companies to take part in this survey and let us know about their experiences.”

The survey will be live until Friday 12 March. Industry-level details of the results will be published by the Construction Leadership Council and used to inform ongoing work designed to support the sector.

*Interested parties can take part in the online survey by accessing this link https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/CLCPII