Pawinder Manak

Pawinder is an associate at SDV Fenchurch. She specialises in insurance and reinsurance disputes and works predominantly within the firm’s UK Financial and Professional Risks Team.

Her practice focuses on advising policyholders on complex coverage disputes involving professional indemnity, financial institutions and specialty insurance policies.

Pawinder advises policyholders on complex insurance coverage disputes, with experience across business interruption, financial institutions, professional indemnity and cyber insurance matters. She has supported clients in a range of high-value and strategically significant claims, assisting with coverage analysis, policy interpretation, litigation strategy and insurer engagement.

Her recent experience includes assisting on a major Covid-19 business interruption dispute involving extensive factual and expert evidence, the preparation of statements of case and the development of litigation strategy in a large-scale, high-value claim. She has also worked on complex financial institutions and professional indemnity coverage disputes, advising on policy wordings, insurer decision-making, coverage positions and matters of policy interpretation.

Pawinder has further assisted with a significant professional indemnity dispute concerning the payment of defence costs, undertaking detailed analysis of novel issues relating to insurer discretion and policy construction. Her work contributed to a substantial rebuttal of insurers’ coverage arguments and helped advance the policyholder’s position in the underlying claim.

Alongside her dispute resolution practice, Pawinder contributes to the firm’s knowledge management, thought leadership and business development initiatives through legal research and publications. She has a particular interest in cyber insurance and emerging risks, regularly analysing evolving coverage issues arising from cyber incidents, technology-related losses and ransomware attacks.