Professional negligence claims and start-up professionals

All professionals, including start-up businesses, are concerned with selling their specialist knowledge, skills, expertise and advice. All consumers have a right to expect that the providers of such a service will, at the very least, be competent, regardless of whether it is a business which has been around for one month or one hundred years. Quite simply, if it is not competent, and financial loss is incurred by a user or customer, it may be possible to make a professional negligence claim .

Start-ups’ service standards

When you make the decision to part with your savings or earnings and employ a professional to perform a service for you, you expect a quality return on your investment. Most of the time this means that you will be employing someone with a wealth of skills, accreditation and experience. However, sometimes you may choose to employ a relative novice or new business to do the job.

Although a professional’s relative lack of experience may mean you pay a lower price, you are still entitled to expect a reasonable standard of work, whether you are employing a construction contractor, an architect, an engineer, a legal professional, an accountant or a professional from another sector. After all, without this expectation there would be little point in hiring their services in the first place.

Checking indemnity insurance

Although many start-ups are, by virtue of being in their infancy, innovative, affordable, cutting-edge and eager-to-please, not all will be cut out for the long haul.

Because of this, there will always be an added element of risk in instructing an up-and-coming professional. As such, it is necessary to ensure that the practitioner has sufficient indemnity cover in place to provide protection against the eventuality of something going wrong.

Sadly, evidence reveals that too few start-up professionals have adequate cover in place, with many having no cover at all.

There is disparity in the uptake of cover by new professionals, depending on the type sector they work in. For example, the more closely regulated professionals, such as accountants and solicitors, are the ones most likely to have cover in place, whereas those from less regulated sectors may wait until they are established before being prepared to shell out the expense.

A spokesperson with business insurance broker PolicyBee comments, “It is clear that there is a stark difference between industries, with those in more regulated sectors such as accountancy and consultancy likely to purchase professional indemnity insurance from the outset.

“In contrast, the more creative sectors such as marketing and design, delay their purchase, which places them at higher risk in the event of a client dispute.”

Professional negligence solicitors in Brighton and London

When you instruct an accountant, financial advisor or banker you expect any advice or products provided to be of the best quality and suitability for your circumstances. If the advice and service you receive turns out to be sub-standard, and you have suffered a loss, you may be able to make a claim for financial redress.

For specialist advice you can rely on talk to our professional negligence solicitors in London and Brighton about making a professional negligence claim . Call directly on 020 7822 4106 or click through to a partner’s profile for our people, our service, our track-record and our accreditations.