A digital-first approach has helped Hiscox London Market’s Flood team build a strong market position in the US private flood market and respond effectively to the flood insurance gap. Here, the Flood team talk about the importance of going digital but also in building and maintaining relationships with broker and coverholder partners. In addition, they explore what it means to be a flood underwriter, the unique skills required, as well as sharing their priorities for the Flood team over the next six months, and why golf, cooking, scuba diving and speaking Spanish are high on the list for the team’s personal development.
Tom King, Flood Line Underwriter
How has your career at Hiscox prepared you for your role as Flood Line Underwriter?
Over the past nine years at Hiscox, I have been fortunate to experience many areas of the business, which has provided me with a unique perspective and set of skills to help in my current role. One key area is understanding the importance of embracing digital. In 2018, I helped develop the FloodPlus platform, an innovative method of distributing flood insurance via API, which helped establish Hiscox as a leader in the US private flood market. We continue to apply a digital-first approach to everything we do in flood.
Another important aspect is prioritising building strong market relationships. Collaborating with our broker and coverholder partners in both property binders and flood, I saw firsthand the importance of understanding their individual needs to create more tailored and efficient underwriting solutions. In our team today, we focus on ensuring that the products we create are adapted to best meet our clients’ demands.
Lastly, agility when dealing with challenges has been crucial. My time leading the Alternative Risk team provided me with broader underwriting expertise across specialist and multi-line products and required both flexibility and innovation when writing new contracts. This approach is something we have also adopted within flood today.
What are your top priorities for your team over the next six months?
We will be focusing on leveraging the updated FloodPlus digital system to drive strategic growth and continue to address the flood insurance gap in the US. Now that all our coverholder partners have been migrated to the improved platform, it allows us to ensure that they are taking full advantage of FloodPlus’ increased limits, optimised pricing, and expanded product range. As the leader of the Flood team, my top priority is to create a challenging yet positive environment where every individual can grow and develop their underwriting career at Hiscox.
Daniel Simmonds, Senior Flood Underwriter
How has your experience across insurance helped you develop your underwriting skills?
I trained as a pricing actuary before moving on to strategy roles in three different business units around the Hiscox Group. This technical knowledge, paired with broad experience across multiple classes of business, has helped me develop my underwriting skills. Flood is an intuitive product offering, as it is easy to picture the loss scenarios, which helps build a comprehensive understanding of risk when underwriting.
What is the most rewarding part about being a flood underwriter?
Meeting coverholders and building relationships with them has been the most rewarding part of my role. Most of our flood portfolio is written through wholesalers in the US, and we share ideas, work through business opportunities, and address issues together.
Seeing the devastation that a flood can cause to a property and knowing that our policy is going to react and support those insureds quickly is also a very rewarding part of the role.
Ben Burge, Flood Underwriter
What are the most valuable skills you developed as a broker that you believe will be useful in your new underwriting role?
Working with a variety of coverholders across product lines has presented various challenges to overcome, whether it’s accelerated growth, loss performance, aggregate management or capacity issues. This has pushed me to review portfolios in different ways to overcome these hurdles and support the product’s longevity which I believe will be useful to the team.
Having experienced these varied situations, I also understand the importance of clear communication with the coverholders to understand the reasoning and impact behind requests, but also how a simple update even with nil progress will help manage expectations.
I have also been fortunate to work with several respected underwriters over the years and believe that their, at times, in-depth questioning and their differing view of underwriting risks will feed into my underwriting role.
What are you most looking forward to as the newest member of the Flood team?
Having worked in the private flood market for several years, I have long admired the FloodPlus product which I am now proud to say I am part of. FloodPlus has recently updated its offering, so I am excited to work with the team to understand the impact of these updates and help contribute to the evolution of the product.
Pia Boileau, Flood Underwriter
What has been the most pivotal point in your underwriting career?
Early on in my underwriting career I was fortunate to join Tom King, Flood Line Underwriter, on a trip to the US where I had the opportunity to conduct an area risk visit of Fire Island, NY. Being on the ground allowed me to see firsthand the unique characteristics of the area, including the landscape, building structures and environmental factors that could significantly impact risks in the area. This experience gave me a more nuanced understanding, allowing me to apply practical knowledge combined with a modelled view and directly apply this to my underwriting decisions.
What do you enjoy most about working on the Hiscox FloodPlus product?
One of the most rewarding aspects of working on the Hiscox FloodPlus product has been the opportunity to join a new team and apply my technology background to a cutting-edge API solution. The FloodPlus API has enabled me as an underwriter and the broader team including Pricing, Exposure and Development, to work closely together in making dynamic decisions with the ability to see both instant and long-term portfolio results and trends.
And now for something a bit more personal... if you could instantly become an expert in any field, what would it be and why?
- Tom: Golf! I really enjoy playing the game with friends, family, and work partners, and I’ve been lucky enough to play on some incredible courses around the world. However, like most golfers, I wish I were better at it. Golf is a brilliant way to connect with people, both personally and professionally, and being an expert would certainly remove a lot of the frustration and allow me to enjoy it even more.
- Daniel: If I could be an expert in any field, I’d choose scuba diving. As an avid diver, mastering scuba diving would allow me to explore deeper and more challenging dives.
- Pia: I would love to master the art of cooking and become an expert chef in all cuisines, that way I’d always keep people guessing as to what will be served up for dinner. I like the idea of being able to surprise friends and family through food and I’ve always thought cooking is a chance to bring people together for a shared experience.
- Ben: If I could be an expert in any field, I’d have to go for the Spanish language. The language is spoken in amazing parts of the world and to be able to navigate these places while speaking the language would enhance the travel experience. My daughter is also learning the language from my wife, so I’d love to be able to contribute to and understand those conversations.
