The broking community is often said to be facing challenges from outside factors, namely disruption from technology and the challenge of more insurers going digital.
But to what extent are brokers really feeling pressure, and how good a job are they doing of adapting?
Brokerslink CEO Jose Manuel told Insurance Business that while brokers probably aren’t adapting very quickly to technology, that’s indicative of a wider trend for conservatism within the industry.
“I think that normally, the insurance side of business is a little bit later than others on the technology side and on investment,” Manuel said in an interview at the Risk Management Society’s annual conference in Philadelphia, USA.
That’s not because the industry is better or worse than its counterparts, he went on to say, but is due to the complex nexus of risks that influence insurance.
“We are influenced by a lot of things that cannot be forecast,” he said, “so this is completely different from banking, from finance… it’s not so easy for this kind of business to standardise, so technology is more complex.”
Eric Richardson, managing director of Boyd Insurance, said that while personal lines in particular have been impacted by the influence of technology, business lines haven’t taken the same hit.
“I think… when it’s your private car or even your household, people will happily go online and look for those products. We have definitely not seen, when it’s somebody’s business they are looking after, that type of impact to anywhere near the same extent,” Richardson said.
People value the advice that their brokers give them, he said.
“It’s advice that we’re giving and it’s the opportunity to check the market on their behalf – as opposed to buying a product that you think is what your business requires, but in reality, people don’t know the full aspects and ranges of covers that you’d expect to find in a commercial contract.”
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