Insurables — Australian business risk, sourced and dated

Conveyancers: professional indemnity requirements in Western Australia

Cover for legal liability arising from professional advice or services, written on a claims-made basis.

Data as at

Verified for Western Australia

  • Licence liability condition: Yes, and Western Australia does something no other jurisdiction surveyed does: a compulsory group insurance policy and a statutory compensation fund operate side by side, not as alternatives. Section 35 of the Settlement Agents Act 1981 lets the Commissioner enter a Master Policy Agreement with an appointed insurer for fidelity insurance and professional indemnity insurance, and sets the minimum cover for each agent at the sum of $250,000 for each claim. The Commissioner has entered one, with cover placed through a commercial insurer, and has determined that all settlement agents must hold a current certificate of insurance under it. Running in parallel, Part V establishes the Settlement Agents Fidelity Guarantee Account, funded by a prescribed fidelity guarantee fee. Section 35(9) preserves an agent's right to take out additional cover on top. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: A certificate of insurance under the Master Policy, produced to the Commissioner on first issue and again as a replacement whenever a certificate ceases to be in force, plus at renewal or on a new licence application. The consequence of lapse is the sharpest mechanism found anywhere in this dataset. Section 35(7) does not suspend the licence — it provides that a licensee who fails to hold or produce the certificate is taken not to be the holder of a triennial certificate until they comply. Since the triennial certificate is what authorises practice, the right to trade disappears by operation of law, with no regulator decision, notice or hearing. The Commissioner's former power to waive the requirement was removed when automatic mutual recognition came in, so there is no discretionary escape either. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: The Commissioner for Consumer Protection licenses settlement agents under the Settlement Agents Act 1981 — settlement agent is Western Australia's term for a conveyancer. Practising authority runs through a triennial certificate rather than an annual licence, which turns out to matter a great deal for what happens when cover lapses. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24

What contracts commonly ask for

Principals and head contractors set their own insurance requirements, and those are frequently higher than a licence condition. The requirement that binds is the higher of the two, and both have to be read from the actual document.

What this cover costs

This site publishes no cost benchmark for this cover. A benchmark needs a real sample of documents, and none is published until the sample is large enough to compute a median honestly. A benchmark from a handful of policies is a guess with a decimal point.

Sources