Skip to Content

Professional Liability Blog

We explore and analyze current issues and relevant topics to help accountants, attorneys, architects and engineers, insurance agents and real estate brokers avoid a professional liability case.

Professional Liability Blog
May 12, 2017

When Things Go South: A Corporate Director’s or Officer’s Personal Liability to Third Parties for Corporate Misdeeds

Generally, corporate officers and directors do not have a special relationship of trust (i.e., a fiduciary relationship) with third persons or creditors transacting business with the corporation. Moreover, unless they sign in an individual capacity, corporate officers and directors who negotiate and execute a contract on behalf of the corporation are not personally accountable on the contract, even if the corporation later defaults or otherwise breaches the contract. Likewise, corporate officers and directors will not be personally liable for the debts of the corporation, even if involved as an agent of the corporation in undertaking the debt.