The biggest challenge facing brokers in 2018 will be changing relationship dynamics between themselves and clients, an expert has said.
Anthony Pagano, head of commercial intermediaries,
Vero, said the whole industry faces challenges on demonstrating value but brokers need to pay particular attention to their relationships.
“As the insurance market changes, insurers and brokers will need to continue to demonstrate value and relevance to their customers,” Pagano told
Insurance Business. “Brokers, in particular, must find ways to move from a transactional relationship with customers to becoming strategic influencers and partners, as highlighted in the Vero SME Insurance Index.”
Looking back on 2017, Pagano highlighted the launch of VeroEdge Packages to brokers as a business highlight.
“We are always looking to enhance our partnership with brokers to create more value for customers, so this was a big achievement,” Pagano continued. “We worked closely with brokers to understand some of the pain points they were experiencing in the previous platform, and reengineered our entire approach to address these pain points.”
For the general industry, Pagano said that the response to major weather events, particularly Cyclone Debbie, was another highlight and showed the importance of the industry to the wider community.
“The industry has worked very hard to finalise thousands of claims in record time,” he said. “It’s amazing that the industry has been able to get people back into their homes so quickly, even though the disaster affected communities in Queensland, NSW and New Zealand.”
Meanwhile, looking ahead, Pagano said that Vero plans to continue to bring together its sales, underwriting, claims and risk management expertise for the benefit of both brokers and clients.
“We will continue to invest in additional enhancements to business insurance, and look forward to seeing this come to fruition,” Pagano concluded.
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