Insurer's withdrawal from rating service disqualifies it from surveyors' approval.
Quinn Insurance has been booted off the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) list of approved professional indemnity insurers.
Quinn, which recently withdrew from Moody’s credit ratings, is a major player in the solicitor professional indemnity (PI) market and does a smaller amount of surveyors PI.
Commenting on the decision to delist Quinn Insurers, Mark Southwell, insurance manager said: “RICS’ minimum criteria, which is used to select insurers which underwrite chartered surveyors PI insurance, stipulates that all insurers must be rated by an external rating agency to pre-defined levels. Quinn Insurers has opted not to be rated by a ratings agency.
“This does not meet the RICS minimum requirements and consequently Quinn insurers hase been removed from the list of RICS listed insurers.”
Tony Blyfield, chief executive of broker Prime Professions, said: “On the basis that Quinn is one of only two or three insurers in the market that is offering cover to chartered surveyors that are 100% survey and valuation work, it will be severely restricting the choice of those firms.
“We’ve only got about four firms with them and this isn’t a substantial book of business for Quinn.”
Quinn has defended its withdrawal from Moody’s, saying there was little chance of the company receiving an upgrade this year.
It also told clients that it had no debt in issue and so the rating was superfluous.
A Quinn Insurers spokesman said: “The market for PI insurance to members of RICS is not, and we do not foresee it being, a strategic part of our UK business.
“We have always offered PI insurance to the surveyor profession that meets the minimum policy wording of RICS regardless of their membership of RICS and will continue to do so. Therefore, meeting approval as a listed insurer by RICS has little or no impact on Quinn Insurance.”.
