If a professional has damaged your health, business, finances, or reputation through negligent service, you will likely be entitled to compensation. Find out how we advocate for Victorians in claims against professionals from all industries.
Professional negligence occurs when a professional doesn’t deliver their service in a way that matches the standard that could be reasonably expected of a person possessing those skills in those circumstances. This might include failing to adhere to relevant laws and/or regulations.
For example, professional negligence could occur when a valuer negligently provides an incorrect property valuation, or a financial planner gives false or misleading financial advice.
The best way to find out whether a professional has been negligent is to talk to a professional negligence lawyer.
To lodge a successful professional negligence claim, you need to prove three things:
Other things the Court considers when you make a professional negligence claim include:
Determining the validity of a negligence claim is complex, so it’s a good idea to contact an experienced solicitor for help.
If you’ve received professional service and/or advice and subsequently suffered a loss of any kind – physical, mental, financial, or reputational – get in touch with our team to explore your options.
If your claim is successful, the Court make a compensation order, which normally covers any losses caused by the claim.
Compensation can include lost opportunity costs – that is, the cost of opportunities (such as revenue opportunities) that you lost as a result of the professional’s negligence.
Compensation may also include interest on funds lost.
Importantly, most professionals have professional indemnity insurance.
That means you don’t have to worry about whether they can personally pay for your compensation – their insurance may cover it for them.
Lawyers are the professionals you turn to for support when you need it most.
Your lawyer should do their best to get you a just outcome – and, if they don’t, then you may be entitled to compensation.
Keep in mind that the standard expected of lawyers is “reasonable care and skill”.
You can’t sue a lawyer just because they didn’t get you the outcome you wanted – they need to have been negligent by failing to meet the standard expected
Examples of possible legal negligence include giving you legally incorrect advice, drafted a legal agreement in a non-binding way, and/or overcharging you.
If you’ve suffered a loss as a result of poor accounting, your accountant may have been negligent.
Giving you incorrect information, failing to calculate tax liability correctly, or making accounting errors could all constitute accountant negligence.
As part of advocating for your rights, we’ll help you prove three things:
Book a free 30-minute consultation with our team to find out how we can help.
Jesse is a highly experienced commercial solicitor admitted at both the Supreme Court of Victoria and the High Court of Australia.
He excels at prosecuting negligent professionals, with a strong record of obtaining financial and non-financial damages for clients who have suffered losses.
When you’re preparing for your consultation with one of our team, reading up on the basics of professional negligence can be helpful.
Get started with our library of easy-to-read articles and guides.
In Victoria, the Limitations of Actions Act 1958 (Vic) limits the time for a negligence claim to be brought to six years after the act or omission that caused the injury or damage.
Exceptions to this limit are negligence claims where you have suffered personal injury (which have a three-year limit) and building actions (which are regulated by the Building Act 1993 (Vic). Building actions can be brought up to 10 years after the issue of an occupancy permit for the building in question (or, in some cases, up to 15 years after).
In professional negligence, a claim must meet three standards, at minimum, to be successful:
The first factor is generally easier to establish than the second and third factors, although, of course, every matter has a unique set of circumstances.
Proving that a professional breached their duty of care first requires the establishment of standards of care, which are formed by looking at:
Those standards can be formed by the opinions of other professionals in the same field or a jury.
Real estate agents are licenced professionals, and, as such, they have a duty of care. This duty of care can be breached by:
This includes deceptive sales and marketing tactics like advertising a property well below its selling price to garner interest or driving up the price through dummy bidding.
Importantly, these breaches don’t have to be intentional. If an agent accidentally leaves out important information or mistakenly gives you incorrect information, they are still considered negligent.
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