By Keri Herlong, CPCU, CIC, CRM, CISR, ACSR, AIM, CIIP, CLP-A, DAE, CRIS
Agents are challenged in today’s marketplace with fighting to keep every renewal while at the same time, building up their book with new business submissions. It probably feels like walking uphill to school in both a snowstorm and a heatwave while being chased by wolves.
As carriers increase rates and property limits, reduce coverage and/or capacity, lay off staff, or exit lines or states completely, agents then scramble to find a new home for their carefully curated books of business.
When carriers are short-staffed, renewal options come later and later in the process, so while your markets are demanding 30 (or 60, or 90) days of lead time, that may simply not be feasible. You’re getting your submissions to market (new and renewal) as fast as you can, but then must follow up multiple times for a quote (or even worse, a decline).
Underwriters who work with independent agents have as many customers as you. They are seeing submissions from your competitors and trying to prioritize their workloads just as you are. What can you do to get your underwriters to respond quickly so you can deliver the best option to your clients?
The best thing you can do is create a narrative in your cover email and make sure your applications are complete (or at least have enough information that the underwriter can take a cursory glance and make a quick yes or no decision). Let’s start thinking about a narrative.
To be real, we know a narrative is going to take extra time – time that you don’t think you have. But I propose that although it will take a few minutes to create a detailed narrative, the time it takes for your underwriter to return a response to you will more than make up for the time it takes to create it.
What should it include?
- A detailed description of operations.
ACORD applications and supplements are usually brief (I can’t tell you how many applications I have seen where the entire description of operations is “general contractor”). Provide pertinent details in your narrative so the underwriter doesn’t have to launch a full investigation to find out what your client does.
- The real effective date.
- Yes, the underwriter can look at the applications or the loss runs and see what that effective date is. But by including the real effective date either in the subject line of your email or early in your narrative, you’re increasing the speed of a decision.
- REAL – If you’re submitting midterm, don’t make your underwriter figure that out on their own. The narrative should explain when the policy actually renews (or date it’s being canceled), what your target effective date is, and why you’re submitting midterm. By doing this, if you’ve given five days for the effective date because that is what you hope you can get, you might get some negotiation if the underwriter thinks they can get it to you with more time, rather than a flat “no”.
- If you have submitted this application in the past, has anything changed? If so, identify that in your narrative.
- Are you willing to split out lines of coverage, or do they all have to go together?
- Property and auto are the driving forces of underwriting and premium right now, so include brief details in your narrative to help your underwriter make a quick decision. Rates have been increasing for several years due to increasing claims plus nuclear verdicts on auto. Closely underwriting these lines are critical for profitability.
- Property
- Total insured value for building and business personal property
- Make sure your application has basic rating details: construction type, occupancy, number of stories, square footage for each building.
- Property
Many underwriters will decline if applications are incomplete, so take the extra time to be sure those boxes are filled.
- Auto
- Be sure your application includes basic rating details for EACH scheduled auto: limits, year, make, model, VIN, garaging zip, radius, use, coverage
- Complete drivers list – including dates of birth
- Your narrative should mention these points:
- Number of vehicles
- Average age of vehicles
- Type of vehicles (i.e., PPVs, light trucks, dump trucks, truck-tractors, etc.)
- Identify gross sales, total payroll, number of units for real estate, or whatever your primary GL and WC rating bases are.
- For contractors, if there is a large schedule of construction equipment, TIV or ACV can be helpful.
- Anything else you think may help improve the response rate.
A good narrative even for a large account should only be about a page and won’t take too much of your time. You should already have all the information you need; you are just summarizing it so the underwriter can use that to make a quick “yes” or “no” judgment on preliminary acceptability.
You can either include the narrative in the body of the email or add it as an attachment. If you do add it as an attachment, make sure you indicate in the email that you have included a narrative (and make it clear which of the attachments it is) to encourage your underwriter to look at it first.
Summary:
Narratives should include the following:
- Detailed description of operations
- True effective date
- Explanation of midterm submission (if applicable)
- Any changes from prior submissions
- Can coverages be split out?
- Property and/or contractors’ equipment TIV
- Number, average age, and type of vehicles
- Summary of GL and WC rating bases
- Anything else you think is helpful
By creating a narrative for your underwriter, they can quickly determine if the account is a true opportunity. This doesn’t guarantee you will receive a quote, but it can make it easier for the underwriter to quickly determine if they can proceed with the underwriting process or give you a decline so you can move on to the next option.
These suggestions are just what I have found helpful as an underwriter. I encourage you to connect with your underwriters and ask if they have any suggestions for how you can work together to improve the response time. In this volatile market, everyone’s goal is a more efficient underwriting process. By creating a narrative, when your underwriters see your name in their inbox, they will know that you have given them what they need to make a quick decision on acceptability, which means response time will improve organically.
Keri Herlong is a Commercial Underwriting Consultant for Acuity and has been in the insurance industry for 30 years. She has been a member of IAIP for over ten years and is a Nevada Member at Large. She has served at the local level as Secretary, President-Elect, and President. She serves on the International Education Task Force and is an Education Liaison for Region VII. Keri has earned several awards from IAIP, including International Client Service Professional of the Year 2023 and International Risk Manager of the Year 2021. Her most recent accomplishments for IAIP include revising and refining the Confidence While Communicating® course and condensing it to create CWC Essentials. Keri is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Applied Management at Grand Canyon University. In 2021, she published her first book, Hindsight 2020, under the pen name Jessie Jericho.