Directors and Officers Liability Insurance covers company directors and officers against claims arising from their wrongful acts whilst managing their business.

An officer can be any individual within a company who makes decisions that affect the company. The title "officer" depends on what an individual does rather than what they are called.

The limit of indemnity chosen by your client should be a combination of what they perceive their exposure to be and how much they are prepared to spend. Remember that this insurance covers your client's personal assets.

No. Corporate reimbursement reimburses the company when the company has paid indemnity or defence expenses on behalf of one of its directors or officers. It is included in most directors and officers policies as standard. Corporate liability cover extends the policy to include protection for the company's own liability and defence expenses.

There are many differences. A D&O policy will include cover for compensation awards and settlements as well as the cost of the defence. A legal expenses policy will only usually cover the cost of defence.

Most legal expenses policies include a "prospect of success clause". This says that, if in the opinion of the insurer, the likelihood of winning the case is less than 50%, they will not offer cover. Angel D&O policies have no such clause and will respond regardless of likely outcome.

Legal expenses insurers will insist on use of their own in-house counsel and the insured is required to immediately notify the insurer of any potential claims without taking any action whatsoever. If the insured deviates from these rules or responds in any way to the claimant, cover may again be denied, with the insurer claiming that any possible defence has been prejudiced. Whilst your D&O insurer will still require notice as soon as possible, any contact prior to such notice will be considered and any potential resulting prejudice will be assessed prior to a coverage position being determined.

Investigation costs and expenses are covered by both legal expenses and D&O policies although a legal expenses policy will specify for which organisations investigation expenses are included whereas an Angel D&O policy does not limit this.

A D&O policy will not cover any prosecution costs.

Our D&O policies provide employment practices liability for individual directors and officers as standard. However, this only extends to claims made against directors or officers personally. In order for the company to be protected against employment practices claims, they will need to purchase our employment practices liability extension. Nearly all employment practices claims are brought against the company, but very few will specifically name a director or officer.

Should the policy limit be completely eroded, our corporate liability extension has an additional limit for unindemnifiable loss that applies solely to claims made against individual directors or officers. The limit available for this extension is 50% of the policy limit, subject to a maximum aggregate limit of £250,000.

Our D&O policy covers the defence costs involved in any "formal" investigations initiated by any organisation. It is important to note that this does not extend to internal investigations initiated by the company itself.

Where the policy has been extended to include corporate liability the policy will respond to allegations of corporate manslaughter.

Yes. These are accessible on the product pages of our website.

Our D&O policy includes cover for subsidiary companies where the holding company is named as the insured. Therefore, to ensure that cover is in place for all subsidiaries, it is vital that cover is purchased in the name of the holding company and that the turnover disclosed is the consolidated turnover for all operating companies.

If a policy is taken out in the name of any subsidiary company, neither the holding company nor any other subsidiaries (other than any subsidiaries of the named insured company) will be covered.

The Declaration needs to be signed and dated by the Insured as this confirms the statements of fact upon which quotations and policies are provided. It also confirms that all material information has been disclosed. This information is relied on when quoting for insurance, determining the premium payable by the insured and assessing the applicable terms and conditions for the policy.

In a partnership there is no corporate entity, so any contracts that are entered into have to be done in the name of one or other of the partners. For example, the photocopier in your office is very likely leased, perhaps from Ricoh or Rank Xerox. This lease agreement will be between your company and the lease company. A partnership cannot lease in the name of an entity because none exists, so one or other of the partners takes out a personal lease. Thus, the exposure to a partner is significantly higher than for a company director.

If the partnership is a limited liability partnership (LLP), the situation would be slightly different because, although the business is not incorporated, the partners have organised themselves into an entity and are therefore treated as such.

If there are two or more businesses with the same directors they would need to buy separate D&O policies unless there is one overall holding company in which case if the policy is bought in the name of the holding company the policy will cover the directors and officers of the holding company and all subsidiaries (as per the definition of "Company" in the policy wording). If however the two companies are only linked by the common directors separate policies are necessary because of the cancellation provisions of the policy which will serve to cancel the policy in the event that one or other of the companies experiences a merger, acquisition, takeover, becomes insolvent or goes into liquidation in which case the surviving entity will have no cover. Because of the way the definition of a "Subsidiary" works companies covered under a policy where a holding company is the named insured, where one of the subsidiaries experiences a merger, acquisition, takeover, becomes insolvent or goes into liquidation, are still covered by the policy whereas cover only for the affected subsidiary will no longer apply.

Professional Indemnity insurance provides cover for claims against the insured for actual or alleged negligent acts; errors, omissions or breaches of the insured's professional duties; or mistakes in providing a professional service.

The amount of cover needed depends on the type of services provided by the insured, what it perceives its maximum exposure to be, or if it has been required to maintain minimum levels of cover for a specific contract.

A Professional Indemnity policy is underwritten based on the turnover or fee income generated from the preceding twelve months. As such, should this amount substantially increase during the policy period, this will be taken into consideration upon renewal. It may be worthwhile contacting the insurer to inform them of the increase during the policy period, as this would be considered a material fact.

Yes. The definition of insured is broad in scope and includes predecessors in business provided the claim is made during the policy period, and the wrongful act did not occur prior to any applicable retroactive date.

The retroactive date is the date following which any wrongful acts committed by the insured will be covered by the policy subject to full policy terms and conditions.

As long as all of the activities and turnover of the applicant and the associated companies are provided when the insurer is quoting, the policy can include cover for all the companies (unless specified). If you are unsure whether an activity is included, it is always best to ask.

With our online Quick Quote system, it should only take you a couple of minutes.

We might not cover that industry or we may call it something different. Give us a call or contact us on Angel Messenger and we'll let you know. Messenger only available within Quick Quote.

If this happens, give us a call. It could be that we're unable offer online quotes for that industry at the moment.

Alternatively, download and complete the proposal form on the relevant page under the products section of our website. Our underwriters will be happy to look at it for you.

If you send us a completed proposal form, found under the product section on our website, we'll get back to you with a quote as soon as possible.

Get in touch with one of our underwriters. They'll be happy to discuss your needs and help you find the cover you need for your client.

You can email one of our underwriters with the correct details or just re-start the online quote process. You'll find our underwriters' details here.

Not online. But if you contact one of our underwriters, they'll be happy to discuss your client's needs.

As a registered agent with Angel, you can quote and bind cover online using our Quick Quote system. Coverage is based on statements of fact, so the insured will need to confirm that all of the statements are true. Occasionally we may ask you to provide us with an application form and provide other information that may affect the decision to provide insurance cover.

Application forms can be downloaded and printed directly from the product pages.

This means that the policy responds to claims that are first made against the insured during the period of insurance.

Sample policy wordings are available on our website in the product pages. The product pages also provide key features and application forms for each available product.

All of Angel's policyholders have exclusive access to a free legal helpline. Details are in the policy documents.

Regardless of what your question is, you will always find someone available to assist you. Your call will never be answered by voicemail and if the person who answers your call cannot help, you will immediately be transferred to someone that can. The contact details of every member of our team can be found by accessing the meet the team section of the website.