Risk Management Survey – this entails a survey of your risk management control system.  This would be a three way test of the controls, i.e. the documented procedures, interviews with the professional practitioners to see whether they understand and adhere to these controls and a file review to check that the controls are being adhered to in practice.  Additionally any professional negligence circumstances are discussed and reviewed for any common themes, if these are apparent we check to see whether follow up action is likely to minimise the chance for recurrence.  These reviews can be completed with one day on-site and a further day to write the report, which would follow a standard template.  Multi-site or multi disciplinary firms would necessarily require longer to review. 

One of the clear advantages of this type of review, from the professional firm’s perspective, is to check that the all the work the senior partners or directors have put into a carefully considered risk control framework are being utilised in practice.

Review of specific control - you may be considering or about to add an additional service and as a result would like to ensure that you have considered all the risk angles.  This could be as simple as a review of your intentions (as a desk based review) just to tease out some of the concerns or might entail a visit.  Again the review can be used to demonstrate to the Insurer (particularly for areas deemed higher risk) that you have considered and where necessary added the necessary additional controls and sign-off.

Post loss review – you have suffered a large loss or series of losses or a potentially large circumstance.  We can look at the circumstances surrounding the claim and see whether the firm’s loss prevention measures failed or whether the event fell outside the current controls and in turn discuss how to help in avoiding recurrence.  This type of review can usually be completed relatively quickly; within half a day or for a more complex situation a day, this would include providing a note of the discussions.  The note of the meeting can be utilised in follow up discussions with Underwriters and usually proves valuable in demonstrating to Insurers the steps taken.

Risk profiling exercise – usually offered as broader than Professional negligence risk, we seek to engage partners or directors in a managed discussion regarding all the risks facing their business.  Discussion is prompted to the extent that we would invite them to consider risk under a number of headings, i.e. client, process, competitor, people, continuity, IT, legal, political etc.

This process can be used equally well to test with partners or directors in prompted discussion about the worst case scenario if a particular insured event were to occur.  This allows us to look at limits of indemnity through a process of discussing scenarios with the senior personnel.  Structured interviews typically take 45 minutes to an hour and therefore a cross section of people representing different functions can be seen in a day.

Seminars – seminars can be run for clients under a number of headings.  Examples might include:

• Senior management wish to discuss the make up of their control systems and check that they are aligned to current best practice thinking;
• Post large loss or circumstance – meet with those responsible for the control infrastructure and discuss whether changes are required to prevent recurrence;
• Taking examples of recent claims to a company and discussing these in a workshop environment;
• An outside perspective on risk management systems and the importance of the controls in place – can be used as a presentation to groups of staff.

Merger or Acquisition – professional firms, when looking to take over or merge with another firm can overlook or underestimate the importance of reviewing the other party’s professional negligence controls.  As a service to clients we can perform a focused survey to review the controls in place and provide them with an external review together with feedback on areas which we consider need additional focus.

Contact - Steve Ray - +44 (0)20 7133 1474 - Professional Indemnity

Steve, prior to joining Windsor, had been a management consultant for 17 years.  In this period he had worked principally with major Insurance companies both on their own internal systems, structures, processes and controls and working on their behalf reviewing and implementing loss control procedures for their Insured clients.