Ames & Gough Did The Survey.
Ames & Gough, a specialty insurance broker, has issued the results of its 2017 survey on legal malpractice claims with nine leading lawyers’ professional insurers. Here are the highlights:
- Insurers saw claims level off in 2016, but costs of defense continue to rise—eight insurers indicate the average costs to defend a typical malpractice claim exceed $50,000 with three seeing costs between $100,000 - $500,000 and two indicating average costs are more than $500,000, with claim complexity and e-discovery being two clear drivers of this trend;
- Insurers cite conflicts of interest as the most common alleged legal malpractice error, with half the insurers citing an uptick in claims from lateral hires;
- Five of the nine insurers saw more cyber-related malpractice claims this year than in prior years;
- Five of nine insurers polled pay hourly rates between $200 - $300, two others pay between $300 - $500 and two pay an average more than $550 per hour for defending malpractice attorneys.
It appears that a copy of this survey may be obtained free of charge by emailing requests to info@amesgough.com, if requesting persons include their name, title, affiliation, and phone number and state “LPL Claims Survey 2017” in the subject line, all according to an Ames & Gough News Release dated June 28, 2017.