Does My Business Need Delaware Directors And Officers Liability Insurance?
If your business has a corporate board, an advisory committee, or has any other type of officer, you should seriously consider investing in a Delaware directors and officers liability insurance policy.
You don’t have to make millions of dollars in revenue for your board of directors to have a personal lawsuit filed against them. Businesses that are on the smaller side and don’t generate a sizeable revenue are likely to need the protection that this type of coverage offers just as much, if not even more so, than large public companies.
What Does Delaware Directors And Officers Liability Insurance Cover?
DE directors and officers liability insurance offers protection for the personal assets of a business’ board of corporate directors and officers, as well as their spouses, if they are ever faced with a personal lawsuit. This includes any lawsuits that may be filed by employees, vendors, investors, customers, competitors and various other people, and suits may filed for real or alleged wrongdoings that have occurred while managing a company. This policy usually protects a business, too.
A Delaware directors and officers liability insurance policy covers any legal costs, including attorney and court fees, as well as settlements, that may occur when a personal lawsuit is filed against a company’s corporate directors and officers.
Why is D&O insurance so important? There are a number of reasons why someone might decide to sue an officer of a business. Some examples include:
- Using business money in a way that it is not intended to be used
- Fraud
- The misrepresentation of the assets that a company offers
- A breach of financial duties that ends up causing financial losses or even bankruptcy
- Not complying with laws that are established for the workplace
- Misconduct or inappropriate behavior in the workplace, such as sexual harassment
- Stealing the ideas of another business and making revenue off of those ideas
- Theft of a competitor’s customer base
While Delaware directors and officers liability insurance does cover a wide variety of lawsuit types, it is important to note that a policy usually does not cover any illegal actions or profits that may be made in an unlawful way.
What Delaware Directors And Officers Liability Insurance Doesn’t Cover
D&O insurance typically does not cover (excludes):
- bodily injury and property damage
- fraud and dishonest acts
- pollution
- breach of contract
Most of the time, a DE D&O policy will include endorsements with additional exclusions based on the applicant’s risk characteristics. These exclusions might relate to areas such as professional services, antitrust, medical malpractice, and publishing.
Types of Directors and Officers Liability Insurance Coverage
When it comes to D and O insurance, people who own a business have several options to choose from and can adjust their polices to their needs. However, there are three main types of coverage. This includes the following:
- A-Side Coverage. This coverage protects directors, officers and in some cases, employees, for attorney fees, settlement costs, or judgments if a business is unable to cover them.
- B-Side Coverage. This coverage shields the company for any losses that directors, officers and employees may experience if a business is unable to cover them.
- C-Side Coverage. This is also known as entity coverage and it protects the company itself. This coverage my minimize the limits that are available to coverage for individual directors and officers.
How Much Does Delaware Directors And Officers Liability Insurance Cost?
How much does Delaware directors and officers liability insurance cost? There are several factors that affect the cost of directors and officers insurance coverage. The type of business you run, the amount of revenue you may, and whether or not there have been any legal claims filed against your company in the past are all factors that are taken into consideration when determining the cost of coverage.
Further Reading On Management Liability Insurance
DE Directors And Officers Liability Insurance Quotes
Request a Delaware Directors And Officers Liability Insurance quote in Arden, Ardencroft, Ardentown, Bellefonte, Bethany Beach, Blades, Bowers, Bridgeville, Camden, Cheswold, Clayton, Dagsboro, Delaware City, Delmar, Dewey Beach, Dover, Ellendale, Elsmere, Felton, Fenwick Island, Frankford, Frederica, Georgetown, Greenwood, Harrington, Houston, Kenton, Laurel, Lewes, Little Creek, Magnolia, Middletown, Milford, Millsboro, Millville, Milton, New Castle, Newark, Newport, Ocean View, Odessa, Rehoboth Beach, Seaford, Selbyville, Slaughter Beach, Smyrna, South Bethany, Townsend, Wilmington, Wyoming and all other cities in DE.
Delaware Insurance Regulations
In the state of Delaware, there are certain regulations that are applicable to both personal and commercial insurance. There are actually tens of thousands of individual regulations, governing everything from the amount of assets or cash an insurance company must have per policy to how insurance companies can advertise, but the list of regulations that you need to know about is thankfully a lot smaller.
DE Commercial Insurance
Commercial insurance, also known as general liability insurance, protects a business and their customers in a variety of ways. One form of general liability coverage is bodily insurance which is physical damage to anyone on your premises other than employees.
Employees are covered under another type of insurance called Worker's Compensation. In addition, general liability can cover properly damage, protect you from personal injury suits, advertising injuries and provide legal defense and payment for judgments.
Delaware is not one of the states where commercial insurance is required to operate a business. Delaware is a modified comparative fault state with a 51% negligence standard. There are no caps on awards for personal injury suits in Delaware and the statute of limitations for filing after something happens is two years.
As for how much insurance you should carry in Delaware, there is no clear answer. The best thing to do is to research the type of business you have and what kinds of lawsuits are possible, as well as what the payouts for those lawsuits usually turns out to be, so that you can see how much liability coverage you should carry.
Delaware Personal Insurance
There are a few different types of personal insurance available for consumers, but the only one that has any sort of regulation that you need to know about is auto insurance. There are laws in place governing how much liability insurance you are required to carry in Delaware. However, there are no regulations that consumers need to be aware of when it comes to life insurance, flood insurance or various other types of available insurance.
As for the auto insurance regulations, the state of Delaware requires you to carry auto insurance that pays as a result of an accident that was your fault. The limits are known as 15 000 USD /30 000 USD /10 000 USD. That means that you are required to have 15 000 USD per person or 30 000 USD per accident in your auto insurance coverage. You will also need to have an additional 10 000 USD for property damage.