The Profession
What to Expect and Prospects
Brokers
Insurance brokers act as intermediaries between insurance companies and insurance buyers, advising prospective policyholders on the most suitable product for their needs, helping to manage and mitigate potential risks and arranging to put cover in place.
Faced with a vast choice of insurers and different types and prices of cover and policy, customers – both individuals and companies – need professional advice. Brokers use their wider knowledge and experience to assess a client's risk profile and find the appropriate cover.
Although they usually receive their commission from the insurance company, brokers are required to be client-focused and manage client relationships effectively. In larger firms, brokers may specialise in specific areas, while those in smaller organisations will carry out a broad range of functions.
What you might do
Building and maintaining relationships with clients is a core element of the job, and as a trainee you are likely to become involved in scheduling and attending meetings, and discussing and assessing insurance needs with clients.
As well as researching policies and products, you will learn to analyse and collate information, keep records, prepare reports, negotiate with insurers, collect premiums and carry out general administrative tasks.
Broking is all about communication and – depending on the type of company you join – you will need to develop key relationships with underwriters, clients and other professionals. You may also become involved in marketing and acquiring new business.
Prospects
Ongoing career opportunities within this field reflect both the range in scale of broking firms and the increasingly international scope of the profession. With a smaller firm you may pursue a rewarding local or regional career, while larger and international firms will enable you to take on national and international responsibilities.
Broking also provides a launchpad for a range of insurance-related careers. Many of those who now specialise in specific areas of insurance like marine, aviation, environment or energy, started their careers by training as insurance brokers.
Others move into management roles – managing a team of brokers or several branches of a brokers' company ญญญ– or other functions within the profession, including underwriting, business development, claims, or technical broking, or sales management.
Claims
When something untoward happens – for example a flood, fire, storm damage or a vehicle accident – insurance policyholders have the right to make a claim.
Insurance claims handlers are responsible for investigating incidents and paying claims. They decide the extent and validity of the claim, helping to minimise the impact of loss by arranging for appropriate action to assist the claimant. At the same time they determine a claim's authenticity, keeping an eye out for fraud. This is particularly important in times of recession, when fraudulent insurance claims increase.
Their work involves coordinating the services that may be required by policyholders following an incident, for example contacting builders to repair damage to a factory or an approved mechanic to mend a car or truck. Claims inspectors aim to quantify and settle claims quickly, resolving issues and negotiating settlements with policyholders or legal representatives.
What you might do
Claims handlers are typically involved in helping to keep businesses running, for example in the event of fire or storm damage, as well as in the key areas of domestic property, for example fire, burglary, and motor vehicle accidents. Insurance claims inspectors also work in risk management teams to assess workplace accidents, or the incidence of work-related illnesses.
Interpersonal skills are key in this area of work, as during training you are likely to become involved in investigating scenes of accidents, taking statements from other professionals, such as the police and medical and technical staff; investigating liabilities and negotiating with experts such as loss adjusters, solicitors and other legal/claims professionals.
Prospects
With experience and performance, career progression up the management structure is possible, either in claims or in other departments of insurance companies.
Gaining more specialised qualifications – through the CII and the Chartered Institute of Loss Adjusters (CILA), both of which provide a range of insurance law exams and qualifications – can enable you to focus on particular areas, such as employers' and public liability, construction or business interruption.
Loss adjusting
Loss adjusters are independent claims experts who help insurance companies and policyholders resolve complex or contested claims and get individuals and businesses up and running again as quickly as possible. Loss adjusting firms also employ technical professionals such as accountants, surveyors and engineers who bring specialist knowledge to individual claims in order to more accurately assess claims.
Loss adjusters' fees are paid by insurance companies, which rely on them and independent mediators to accurately assess claims on site. The profession has its own chartered institute and in almost all cases you will be expected to join and abide by its charter. The profession is changing fast as new technical innovations come on stream and the firms respond to the demands of their clients for faster processing and a multidisciplinary approach – a loss adjusting 'one-stop shop'.
What you might do
In a domestic case, a firm of loss adjusters would typically be called in to assess the scale of loss of, for example, a house fire or flood damage. That firm would then despatch a loss adjuster to the scene to meet with the policyholder. Imagine visiting homeowners in Hull after the 2007 floods and helping them to value their losses and advise on how best to begin re-establishing their homes.
Commercial claims are often more complex and of a larger scale, and will involve issues such as business interruption and liability. These are therefore usually handled by more experienced loss adjusters, but the principle remains the same – assess the loss and help the policyholder to begin recovery.
In contested claims, a loss adjuster may also be required to investigate the cause of the loss – how a fire started, what happened in a motorway incident, etc.
As a graduate coming into loss adjusting you will usually be expected to gain some experience of desk-based claims management before going out on the road to handle individual claims files and meet policyholders.
Prospects
Within loss adjusting you will enjoy the opportunity to pursue technical and specialist routes, and also a management route, either running regional offices or specialist teams, for example fraud, subsidence, domestic or large loss.
Reinsurance
Reinsurance companies are the profession's own insurers, enabling large and small companies to mitigate their own potential risk, either of a single massive claim or of a large volume of claims at the same time.
Because of the scale of the risks insured, reinsurance companies are frequently global businesses and will take a highly strategic, long-term interest in evolving trends and patterns. Aviation, marine and energy are key markets for reinsurance, owing to the scale of risk but reinsurers also provide cover to property and motor insurers and liability specialists.
What you might do
Reinsurance is a broad field embracing many of the disciplines in the wider insurance profession – broking, underwriting, claims and actuarial for example – but it is distinguished by the sheer scale of the risks and the international nature of the companies in this area.
After general training you will enjoy opportunities to specialise in one aspect of reinsurance, such as broking, or to focus on an economic region or specific sector such as marine or aviation.
Prospects
Ongoing career opportunities within this field reflect both the scale of reinsurance firms and the increasingly international scope of the profession. With the larger and international firms you will quickly take on national and international responsibilities with the possibility of travel and international secondments and placements.
You will also have the chance to develop close relationships with very substantial insurance clients and become their main point of contact, helping them to evolve their cover as their needs and the demands of the profession change.
Alternatively, you may choose to move into a management role – managing a regional or national team including underwriting, business development, claims or technical broking, or sales management.
Risk management
General insurance companies, brokers and other specialist firms employ professionals to help them assess the potential financial risks posed by offering insurance cover for particular items or properties. Risk surveyors provide underwriters – who assess risks, and set the terms and prices of insurance policies – with information on levels of risk associated with each client, and the ways in which those risks could be minimised.
Roles include risk surveyors, risk control surveyors, risk analysts or risk advisers, some of whom specialise in specific areas such as fire, health and safety, theft or public liability.
What you might do
As a risk professional, you are likely to spend much of your time visiting clients and conducting detailed surveys of sites to be insured. You'll also be responsible for carrying out research to assess and evaluate risk; writing reports for underwriters; staying abreast of legislative developments; advising clients and liaising with insurance underwriters and brokers. You may need to collect evidence to support your assessments and also to make recommendations for improvements that will reduce risks – for example to add fire exits, burglar alarms or CCTV cameras, etc.
Prospects
Individual employer companies usually define progression within their own organisation, from trainee roles to senior surveyor positions, heads of department or senior management roles, where the work is likely to be more administrative and strategic.
As you progress, you may choose to concentrate in a specialist technical field, moving into risk assessment in a particular sector.
Underwriting
Underwriters assess risks and decide whether to accept applications for insurance cover – and on what terms. This is a core skill because it is the essence of insurance – carried out well, it will minimise losses for a company and help it to make a profit. Consequently, underwriting capability has massive influence on the competitiveness of insurance companies.
Underwriters, who often specialise in one type of insurance, determine policy terms and conditions, and calculate premiums based on risk assessment, statistical and background information – looking at the potential for a loss based on their experience of a particular trade or sector.
What you might do
Underwriting work is largely about relationship building and it demands close attention to detail. You are likely to be involved in networking to get things done, gathering and assessing information, studying proposals and, for any given scenario, calculating possible risk, weighing up the likelihood of a claim being made and in what timeframe.
Underwriters compute results to determine the cost of insurance and decide whether the risk is viable. You might also find yourself liaising with specialists, negotiating terms with policyholders or brokers, specifying conditions for certain types of cover, and drawing up policies and contracts.
Prospects
Movement into other core areas of insurance – for example risk management, claims or broking – is quite common for experienced underwriters, whose broad experience also gives them scope for general management roles.
Alternatively, you could choose to move into reinsurance to deal with very complex cases and high levels of risk, or progress into a specialist field, such as marine or aviation insurance. If you speak one or more foreign languages, there are also possibilities to work abroad.
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