The wise advice "just be yourself and follow your instincts" applies to insurance agents seeking to mitigate the risk of malpractice litigation. In a competitive market, staying inside of your comfort zone and following a few well established "best practices" can help you avoid being sued for malpractice and, if unfortunately you are sued, help you to present a strong defense.

The starting place to avoiding a future malpractice claim is at the beginning of a client relationship. Set the tone early with new clients. Make sure the client has reasonable expectations as to what services you will be providing and, perhaps more importantly, what you will not. Once the client relationship begins, follow best practices, the ones you know you should be doing:

• Ask questions. Make sure you and your client are clear on what type of insurance and how much coverage your client needs.

• Clients make assumptions about types of insurance, coverage limits, deductibles, exclusions and the like. Go through each critical element of the policy with the client.

• Keep notes of telephone and in-person conversations. Write down the date and names of all participants. Document your client's key decisions and directions.

• Follow up each significant discussion in which decisions are made with an e-mail that recaps the conversation. Essentially, you are putting what was discussed into electronic black-and-white. This e-mail may provide evidence should a client claim in court that you gave misleading or erroneous information.

• Always have a policy application reviewed by the client after it is completed. A lot of agents do business over the phone or by email because they and their clients are too busy to meet in person. Frequently you or someone in your office completes an application for your client. That practice leaves the agent — not the client — exposed to legal trouble.

• Send the application to the client with an e-mail or cover letter telling the client to let you know if the application or the requested coverage is inaccurate.

• Forward to your client any written quotation you received from a broker or insurance company and have them confirm, in writing, that they want you to bind a particular policy.

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