Capping an 18-month in-depth process of researching the underwriting needs of property/casualty insurers, FirstBest commissioned an independent research firm, The Phelon Group, to survey 300 insurance carriers ranging from $200 million to $1 billion in premiums written. More than half the respondents were C-level executives, while the remaining represented underwriting management.
Among the survey's top findings:
•The top-most concern for property/casualty carriers is how to get profitable business on the books in a softening market.
•The top underwriting issues are improving the ease of doing business with agents – cited by 33 percent of respondents as most important – and automating their underwriting operations – ranked most important by 30 percent of respondents.
•While carriers believe their underwriting processes are inefficient and weighing down their organizations, they are not willing to "rip and replace" their home-grown legacy systems. Rather, they need a solution that will leverage the systems and infrastructure they already have in place.
The respondents cited these requirements for technologies to improve underwriting management:
•More automation, including both straight-through and exception-based underwriting.
•Greater ease of use for agents to place business and interact with carriers.
•Real-time collaboration for underwriters and agents.
•A better way to maintain underwriting discipline.
•Faster creation of new products to increase speed-to-market.
•Management visibility into the underwriting process.
•The ability to capture and share underwriters' knowledge and experience.
For a copy of the summary report on the study, "Underwriting 2.0: A FirstBest Study of Key Requirements for P&C Insurance Carriers," please contact Meira Primes, vice president of marketing, at primes@firstbest.com.