Professional Liability Insurance - it's your responsibility

All regulated members (general, provisional and courtesy) must have their own professional liability insurance (PLI) in order to be registered with the College. This is a legal requirement of all regulated health professionals in Alberta.

Professional liability insurance exists so that professionals may be protected in the case of a suit against them that brings their professional conduct or services into question.  In the case of a regulated professional, PLI also protects the public the instance where damages are awarded by the appropriate judicial body.

Council requires, as per the legislation, that all members hold at least $2,000,000 PLI per occurrence with a $2,000,000 aggregate.  This is in Canadian currency.  This has not changed from previous years.

What has changed is that up until now, the College has essentially brokered your PLI for you.  This ensured you had it for not only your sake, but the College’s. However, the instance under which you would need PLI is if there was a complaint brought against you by the College. This may be on behalf of a third party (i.e., the patient) or by the College itself.  As you can infer, the College providing you PLI in the case where it is needed because of the College is a conflict of interest. As such, the College is divesting of this brokerage for the 2020 registration year.

You may be wondering “now what do I do?”.  Well, there are a lot of resources available to you to acquire PLI at the levels required by Council.  The Denturists Association of Alberta has been diligently working this year to provide a member service for you which includes a robust PLI policy.  You may also purchase independent PLI through an insurance agent or broker.

Whichever route you choose, it is your responsibility to acquire this PLI for 2020.  This must be done prior to your registration renewal this fall as you will be asked to attest to having PLI for the 2020 registration year.  You can only attest to having it, when you already do. Please remember, that your registration renewal application is a legal document and any false information provided may have impact on your registration as a denturist in Alberta.

You may be wondering how will the College know if I have it or not?  That’s a good question, and the College has to do its due diligence as we are being monitored as well. As a result, early in the new year, the College will be conducting an audit of a randomly selected sample of regulated members, who will be required to produce proof of PLI and that it was acquired prior to their declaration at renewal.

Should you have any questions about PLI or how to acquire it, please contact the College.