What is required to obtain an Excess quote?
1. The most recent primary application
2. Currently valued 5-year loss runs
3. A completed BDP Excess application (for SJX/SCX)
4. A contract requiring the limits (for SJX/SCX)
5. Primary policy premium, limits and deductible (preferably the declaration page)
Who is eligible for a Run-Off policy?
A current policyholder who has been with Berkley Design Professional for a minimum of two years
• The firm must be eligible for a renewal quote
• The firm must have completed all projects, with minimal exceptions
– Barbara Block | Assistant Vice President, Senior Underwriter
What differentiates BDP’s Excess offering?
BDP’s excess policy is written on admitted, follow-form paper. Our excess policyholders are provided access to all of our risk management materials via BDP Risk. We offer three policy options: excess over the entire underlying policy, specific job excess and specific client excess.
– Colleen Kennedy | Assistant Vice President, Senior Underwriter
Albany, N.Y. (July 21, 2021) – Walter J. Adams, Jr., vice president and assistant claims manager at Berkley Alliance Managers, a Berkley Company, will discuss ways to Get Ahead of the Claim: Professional Liability in a Post-COVID-19 World at the CLM 2021 Annual Conference to be held at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis in Atlanta, Georgia. During the roundtable discussion scheduled for Thursday, August 12th at 2:00 p.m. EST, Adams will highlight the novel claims faced by design and construction professionals in a pandemic environment and proactive methods to protect against increased exposures.
“Nearly every individual, organization and profession nationwide were impacted by the coronavirus,” says Adams. “Many construction projects were either delayed or canceled, which created incentives to accept less than desirable projects or contracts. This roundtable will profile the many challenges professionals overcame during this time and the risk management strategies that will help them navigate through a post-COVID-19 world.”
Read more »By Robert J. Connor, JD, CIC
Senior Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer, Berkley Alliance Managers, a Berkley Company
July 12, 2021
Design professionals are busy these days and often find it difficult to step back from their day-to-day business responsibilities to delve into the world of risk management education.
Fortunately, Berkley Design Professional has made it easy for our policyholders to find just the right risk management sessions and courses! The BDP Risk® Learning Management System (LMS), provides 24/7 online access to relevant risk and practice management content, streamlined online learning and education activity tracking and reporting.
Let’s take a look at the top ten reasons to use the BDP Risk® LMS today!
Read more »By Robert J. Connor, JD, CIC
Senior Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer, Berkley Alliance Managers, a Berkley Company
June 10, 2021
You receive a call from your design firm client asking for higher limits for their professional liability insurance policy. And you think…will their current carrier provide the Excess limits? If yes, has the firm reached its limit on the number of Excess endorsements on their policy? If no, what do you do?
For either of those questions, Berkley Design Professional has your answer – BDP Excess. We have an admitted, follow-form Excess Professional Liability policy that can be written over a competitor’s entire policy, on a specific client basis or on a specific job basis. We offer limits up to $10 million. In addition, BDP Excess is available to each of our brokers in all states. How is that for flexibility?
At Berkley Design Professional, we recognize that when your clients call with an Excess request, you need to be able to respond quickly to meet their needs. Otherwise, they may start looking for another broker. As a former broker myself, I can relate to that scenario as it happened to me. I lost a considerable account because the incumbent professional liability insurance carrier would not provide a specific-job excess quote and I could not find a viable, cost-effective alternative in sufficient time to meet my client’s needs.
Read more »A small silver lining in an otherwise difficult situation
By Liz Molina
Assistant Vice President, Senior Claims Examiner, Berkley Alliance Managers, a Berkley Company
May 10, 2021
As long as I have been managing claims for design firms, one of the primary risk management principles held by architects and engineers (A&E) professional liability insurance (PLI) carriers is that a design professional should avoid suing their clients for unpaid fees.
Why? Because a suit for outstanding fees is usually met with a counterclaim for professional negligence. And, while in general, those allegations trigger coverage under an A&E PLI policy, the attempt to recover the outstanding fees is not covered because fees are not considered damages as defined in A&E PLI policies. Unfortunately, the outstanding fees become part of the negotiations when attempts are made to resolve the negligence allegations. In most cases, the design firm has to significantly compromise its fee claim – and sometimes completely walk away from it – in order to get the negligence claim resolved, even when some of the negligence allegations lack merit or would be difficult to prove. This leaves the design firm frustrated because they end up not getting paid, while at the same time having to spend their policy deductible to defend and/or settle the negligence claim. In essence, they actually lose more money, which does not even include the lost billable time that was spent helping to defend the claim instead of working on projects that generated income.
Read more »
Presented by:
David J. Hatem, PC, Partner, Chair, Professional Practices Group, Donovan | Hatem, LLP
Andrew D. Mendelson, FAIA, Senior Vice President, Chief Risk Management Officer, Berkley Design Professional
Tuesday, May 18, 2021
10:00 am – 11:30 am Pacific Daylight Time
1.5 AIA Learning Units
1.5 RCEP Professional Development Hours
This webinar has been recorded and is available on demand for Berkley Design Professional policyholders and our appointed agents and brokers on the BDP Risk® Learning Management System.
bdp Risk® lms loginBerkley DP is pleased to offer a live webinar featuring David J. Hatem, PC, and Andrew D. Mendelson, FAIA.
Design-Build (DB) is increasingly popular as the delivery method of choice for many governmental entities (federal, state, and local) for public infrastructure projects. Those owners are attracted not only to the ability to contract on a fixed-price basis with a design builder who is responsible for both design and construction but also to the opportunity to transfer substantial risk—which would traditionally be retained by the owner—to that design-builder.
Read more »By Diane P. Mika, Vice President and Director of Risk Management Education,
Berkley Design Professional, a Berkley Company | April 12, 2021
Education is a good thing, right? We at Berkley Design Professional certainly believe so. Our BDP Risk® courses and resources are intended to help our insured architects and engineers improve project management practices, enhance business performance and minimize risk.
But belief and proof are not the same. So we went to our data.
The Numbers Tell a Story
Our curious data scientists (otherwise known as actuaries) pored through the numbers—course participation, claim data and underwriting files—and the results were overwhelmingly positive. BDP Risk® education makes a difference in claim frequency, customer loyalty and broker success.
Read more »
By Robert J. Connor, JD, CIC
Senior Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer, Berkley Alliance Managers, a Berkley Company
While professional liability is a real risk to all design firms and purchasing professional liability insurance is a prudent course of action, the fact is that many design firms never have a claim. Berkley Design Professional’s First Claim Deductible Credit recognizes that fact and provides policyholders with significant savings on their deductible if they meet the requirements in the policy.
The specific policy1 language is:
If the first Claim you ever report to us is made against you:
If more than one Deductible Credit applies, your Deductible obligation will be reduced by 50%, subject to a maximum reduction of 50%.
Read more »© 2025 Berkley Design Professional. All rights reserved.
