ABSTRACT
From the beginning of the developments in marine insurance in the eighteenth century, insurance brokers to date have always played a crucial role in the operation of the insurance transactions. This is because of the nature of the business conducted by the brokers: bringing assured and insurers together, acting for the insurer when instructed eg for collection of premium and obtaining reinsurance for insurers. Given the range of clients that brokers work with, they are called as ‘servants of the market’. Brokers owe duty of care at the pre-and post-contractual stages to their clients and this chapter refers to those duties in detail. Key words: duty of care, absolute duty, exercise reasonable skill and care, breach of the duty, negligence, duties on renewal, duty of disclosure, duty to not misrepresent material facts, producing broker, placing broker, non-delegable duty, assumption of responsibility, contributory negligence, apportionment of liability, claim against insurers, insurer’s rejection of the claim and claim against the broker, the assured’s loss as a result of broker’s negligence, causation, breaking the chain of causation, broker’s commission.
