Private legal expenses

What is it?

Legal expenses insurances (LEI) are a relatively young branch of insurances, effectively going mainstream in the early nineties. With the increasing “juridification” of our society, the importance of these insurances in general and private LEIs in particular continues to increase.

A private LEI is supposed to enable you to get your right in all private matters. In order to do that, you receive, amongst other things, legal and financial support.

The background is quickly explained: In order to be active in the legal system, you need a lawyer, time and money. Because not everyone has the expertise, the money or the time needed and that should not keep you from pursuing your rights, LEIs have been created.

Private LEIs are modular. You can put together your legal protection like a building kit and that way you can put together the legal protection you need.

What are the benefits?

LEIs, in general, have two main tasks respectively provide, amongst other things, mainly the following two main services:

Advice and legal support by lawyers
Reimbursement of the lawyer, court and process costs

Usually, you can get an initial consultation by phone for free and try to assess whether you want to take legal action. If so, you get the full support that a case requires.

As the name suggests, a private LEI is limited to private disputes. This means that e.g. everything that has to do with your job is not covered.

Furthermore, the exact coverage ultimately depends on your plan. Areas such as tax law or inheritance law are not included in most basic plans and must be explicitly chosen.

Who is it for?

The opinions on whether a private LEI makes sense for most people can differ greatly.

The fact is that the number of legal cases and disputes has been growing steadily in all areas of life for years. Furthermore, more and more areas of our lives are affected by laws. Additionally, the process and lawyer costs are often much higher than the original dispute value (and higher than most people realize).

If you generally drive a lot, fear conflict with your neighbours or landlord or are worried that high litigation costs will keep you from enforcing your rights, you should sign up for a private LEI.

However, this decision should be well considered and other insurances such as an occupational disability insurance or a personal liability insurance should have higher priority.