Professional Indemnity (PI) insurance for solicitors is one of the most influential areas of the PI market, it has been claimed.

James Dieppe, financial services analyst at Datamonitor, suggests that solicitors and legal practitioners are those most responsible for maintaining a healthy PI industry.

"One of the biggest sectors is cover for lawyers and solicitors where it is compulsory to have cover," he explains.

Meanwhile, he states that there are "a number of things" which could affect the cost of PI premiums for solicitors wishing to renew their policy ahead of the October 1st deadline.

Marc Riches, Assistant Director of solicitors specialist Lloyd's broker PYV Legal, said: "Generally it is true that insurers look closely at the performance of this sector, and will factor in this performance when setting rates for next year."

He continued: "The general consensus at the moment suggests that the current rates are unsustainable and may rise, even before 1st October 2007- and we do therefore recommend that solicitor practices renew as early as possible and should certainly seriously consider any 'early bird' renewal offers to take advantage of discounted rates."