Your Duty Of Disclosure
Before you enter into a contract of general insurance with an insurer, you have a duty, under the Insurance Contracts Act 1984 (Cth), to disclose to the insurer every matter that you know, or could reasonably be expected to know, is relevant to the insurer’s decision whether to accept the risk of the insurance and, if so, on what terms. You have the same duty to disclose those matters to the insurer before you renew, extend, vary or reinstate a contract of general insurance.
Your duty however does not require disclosure of matter:
- that diminishes the risk to be undertaken by the insurer;
- that is of common knowledge;
- that your insurer knows or, in the ordinary course of its business, ought to know;
- as to which compliance with your duty is waived by the insurer.
Non-Disclosure
If you fail to comply with your duty of disclosure, the insurer may be entitled to reduce their liability under the contract in respect of a claim or may cancel the contract. If your non-disclosure is fraudulent, the insurer may also have the option of avoiding the contract from its beginning.
Statutory Liability Extension and Errors & Omission Endorsement is Claims Made Insurance
The Statutory Liability and Errors & Omission is an Extension to the Policy and is ‘Claims Made’ insurance. This means that the extension covers you for any claims made against you and notified to the insurer during the period of insurance.
This extension does not provide cover in relation to:
- acts, errors or omissions that occurred prior to the retroactive date (if one is specified) in the policy;
- any claim made, threatened or intimated against you prior to the commencement of the period of insurance;
- any claim or fact that might give rise to a claim, reported or which can be reported to an insurer under any insurance policy entered into before the commencement of the period of insurance;
- any claim or fact that might give rise to a claim, noted in this proposal or any previous proposal;
- any claim arising out of any fact you are aware of before the commencement of the period of insurance;
- any claim made against you after the expiry of the period of insurance.
However, the effect of Section 40(3) of the Insurance Contracts Act 1984 (Cth) is that where you become aware, and notify us in writing as soon as is reasonably practicable after first becoming aware but within the period of insurance, of any facts which might give rise to a claim against you, any claim which does arise out of such facts shall be deemed to have been made during the period of insurance, notwithstanding that the claim was made against you after the expiry of the period of insurance.
Your Duty of Disclosure requires you to tell us of any information that may affect our/an insurers decision to insure you. Each person(s) or entity named as the insured has this duty of disclosure. If you do not tell us about any information which may be relevant to accepting this insurance, this may result in the refusal or redirection of claims or the cancellation of this policy.
I/We have read and agree to the above and by completing the following fields, declare that the information provided above and in all appending sections is true to the best of My/Our knowledge.