The Conveyancing Association (CA) has announced a new partnership with DUAL Asset Underwriting, launching an online service providing conveyancing firms with a new way to arrange legal indemnity insurance for residential transactions.

The new online comparison service provides firms and their clients with an opportunity to search, choose and buy legal indemnity policies.

Users of the service go through a three-step process from initially answering a common set of underwriting questions, moving on to obtain and compare at least three quotes (plus they can combine up to four risks in one quote/policy without the need to speak to an underwriter), after which they can order and receive their policy in seconds.

The system has been launched with three insurers – Royal & Sun Alliance, XL Catlin and Elite Insurance Company Ltd – with more to follow. Quotes include premium, insurer’s financial strength rating, whether legal defence costs are limited, excess options, and mortgage lender-only options.

Other key features to the system include:

• 40 different risks available online.
• Most flexible underwriting criteria in the market.
• The ability to bind up £5m online.
• Each quote automatically comes with a ‘Demand and Needs’ statement.
• The option to email the quote summary directly to a client, colleague on the other solicitor.

All polices on the system are ‘unlimited’ unless otherwise stated and those few that are ‘restricted’ by term have this clearly stated in the quote summary and on screen. Where any lender is involved the policy will still always run for the term of the mortgage regardless.

In terms of legal expenses, options include policies where they are ‘unlimited’ and therefore not deducted from the policy amount in the event of a claim, as opposed to ‘limited’ where the more typical scenario is for the insurer to limit its total liability, including legal expenses, to the policy amount.

Lloyd Davies, operations director at the Conveyancing Association, said: “At present the system for sourcing and securing legal indemnity insurance is particularly convoluted and provides little choice unless you are willing to go through multiple online applications.

“By launching this new partnership and system with DUAL, the Association is able to offer conveyancing firms the ability to source like-for-like policies across a number of different insurers and search up to 40 different risks online. It therefore provides a much more ‘Treating Customers Fairly’-focused service for firms and is a smarter and safer way to arrange legal indemnity quotes and policies.

“We at the Association certainly believe that firms and their clients have much to gain from using this system and we are wholeheartedly recommending the service to our members.”

Mark Dennis, head of residential risks at DUAL Asset Underwriting, said: “It’s great to work with The Conveyancing Association on this new initiative, given its status as the leading trade body for the conveyancing industry. This is the next evolution, presenting a choice of legal indemnity quotes and products for the conveyancer and client from different insurers, all from a single website.

“The website also allows conveyancers to combine a number of risk covers all under a single quote/policy. Arranging legal indemnity insurance has just taken another significant step forwards.”