|
Tuesday,
May 24
Monday,
May 23
Sunday,
May 22
|
|
News
for Monday, May 23
ACORD and LOMA Presidents Welcome and Encourage Attendees
Gregory A. Maciag |
An estimated 2400 attendees today received a warm welcome from LOMA president and CEO Thomas Donaldson and ACORD president and CEO Gregory Macaig. Donaldson spoke of an industry facing challenges - new regulations, mergers, demographic change, globalization and technological change - but cited technology as holding the promise of helping to meet challenges. "The Forum," said Donaldson, "can bring to light real experiences of companies that despite tough times, have found ways to achieve business success." Maciag agreed that technology plays an ever increasing role in helping the
Thomas P. Donaldson |
|
insurance business face a complicated world. He urged attendees to see data standards as a business tool, rather than IT tool. A standards strategy can help connect the dots on the C-level executive's screen - revenues, expenses, product development, outsourcing, integration, compliance, distribution - and bring companies into a successful future, interacting with new trading partners in new and creative ways, he told attendees.
Opening Video - 56K | 256K | 512K
Opening Remarks: Gregory A. Maciag, ACORD - 56K | 256K | 512K
Opening Remarks: Thomas P. Donaldson, LOMA - 56K | 256K | 512K
TOP
Keynote Don Tapscott Sees Transparency as a Business Strategy
Don Tapscott |
Be transparent not just because New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer says you have to, but because it makes good business sense," advised futurist and author Don Tapscott in his Keynote address. Tapscott laid out the lessons for the scandal-plagued insurance industry from his latest book, The Naked Corporation.
TOP
Session Offers Strategic View of P&C Underwriting
A recent TowerGroup Report, Underwriting Efficiency and Effectiveness Study, showed a softening in the market for 2005 resulting in a growing concern at the CEO level about returning to old ways. According to the study, which was sponsored by Risk Click, this is causing insurance companies to view underwriting differently.
Mark Gorman, TowerGroup, told attendees that study results indicate, "Carriers are looking, more and more, for a competitive advantage." In addition, he said, "The insurance environment is changing." Factors such as attorney general investigations into broker compensation, changes in regulations, the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley legislation, and an even stronger focus on risk management, all are part of this changing landscape. He added, "There's also a growing awareness that market leaders are building their leadership position," and that other companies - those that are behind in market share - are looking for ways to leapfrog into top spots.
According to Gorman, carriers are working in several areas - including redeployment of IT development resources- to address these issues. "Carriers are reducing information technology infrastructure costs, renegotiating contracts and flipping dollars for new development," he says. Gorman noted that one carrier ridded itself of 85 redundant systems as part of its strategic endeavor. Another, he said, realized a net gain of two people to handle new technology development simply by moving one system's change request management from IT to the business unit.
Gorman also sees increased carrier implementation of predictive analytics - being able to judge who is likely to have a claim based on information available today - as another way carriers are trying to succeed in today's climate. "Predictive analytics and robust business rules can boost profitability," he said. "Whether building or buying predictive analytics, you have to get the information right." According to Gorman, executive sponsorship is among the most important success factors when of opting for any of these tactics or approaches.
To obtain a copy of this report, please click here
TOP
From Risk Manager to Carrier and Back -- STP and Its Benefits
The focus on risk management has become increasingly strong over the past few years as has the need for streamlining the process and data communication. From Risk Manager to Carrier and Back - STP and Its Benefitsexamined the current needs of risk managers as they work towards achieving straight through processing.
The panelists, Elizabeth Morrell, senior risk analyst, Southern Company, Patrick Vice, IT manager, Frank Cowan Company Ltd., and Jo Conway Roberts, insurance solutions client executive practice leader, CS Stars - cited three factors which are increasing the demand for data standards implementations:
1. A growing awareness among risk managers
2. A changing regulatory environment
3. An increasing demand for real-time data
The panelists emphasized that standards reduce frictional costs and improve service both internally for integration and externally with customers and insurers.
The overarching message of this session was the importance of information to all members of this information chain: carriers, brokers, and TPA's. However, that data isn't useful as "information" until it is organized, decoded, and consolidated. Information drives business decisions and comes from every direction. The goal of the Risk Manager is to manage this information in order to manage their total cost of risk.
Download the presentation TOP
Conform to Forms... or Not
For years, ACORD has developed forms to improve workflows throughout the insurance business. And agents have become accustomed to using them. So it comes as no surprise that when standardized ACORD forms aren't available, and carriers require use of proprietary ones, agents take notice. This formed the basis for a session, led by Donna Barr, assistant vice president for Marsh USA and Jo Ann Litwin, principal of Litwin, Castle & Christ agency.
According to Litwin and Barr, agents report that carriers rely more on their own forms to get different data, something that is detrimental to efficient agency workflows. This doesn't have to be, they said. ACORD and the volunteers who work with it can find ways to address company-specific data needs within the ACORD process. "ACORD will help create new forms," they said. "Plus, there is a procedure to add questions to existing forms."
Keith Savino, agency principal of WRG and an ACORD board member, detailed a project that does just that. Savino is spearheading development of forms that address professional liability and specialty lines. "Standards improve workflows, and they contribute to ease of doing business and good will between trading partners - regardless of the line of business," he says. "There's a return on investment. Time savings equals money savings."
Savino discounted the belief that because these lines often require unique information that they're not conducive to standardization. "It's not so unique that you can't get reinsurance for the business," he says. "Plus, if carriers really want the business, they actually will quote off of another carriers application."
According to Savino and other session presenters, agents and brokers need to continually call for ACORD forms, because they drive consistency, support download and real-time, and, in the end, save time and money for agencies and carriers, alike.
Download the presentation TOP
London Market: Modernization on Two Fronts
The 300-year-old London insurance market is grappling with changes on two broad fronts: regulatory reform and an interoperable insurance marketplace. In the session Reality Check: London Market Reform and Update View from Lloyds, Company Market, and Brokers, market experts discussed how the ongoing London Market reform agenda is addressing the need for change.
Chris Rawson, CIO, Lloyd's of London, noted that the London market regulators are demanding greater contract certainty and efficiency. As a result, the market has been adapting long-standing processes and practices. Meanwhile, adding to the modernization push are the global demands for interoperability among markets and market players to provide complex coverages more efficiently. Central to delivering on both issues is new technology, including standards-based interoperable systems.
Rawson stated that the vision of reform is that the "exchange of data and the progress of a transaction is captured in a collaborative electronic system." While players in the London market fully accept the need for change, there is a tremendous volume of work to turn the vision into reality.
A key reform is converting the "slip" (which includes broker details, risk information, and underwriter information) into an electronic format, noted Roger Foord of technology service provider Roger Foord Associates.
Trevor Maddison, SVP, Marsh Inc., noted one key area of progress: electronic handling of all new claims is targeted to start in mid-2006, with at least 75% of claims targeted for electronic processing within five years.
Download the presentation
TOP
Reinsurance: Long Connected, Recently Wired
The reinsurance business-long connected informally-is forging ahead with new connectivity options. Hubs, exchanges and gateways have historically provided value to the industry. The leaders of the three major electronic platforms - Igor Best-Devereaux, CEO, eReinsure; Toby Davies, Chief Executive, Kinnect; and Alex Letss, Chief executive, RI3K, discussed the role of these platforms and presented the value proposition of their solutions.
- eReinsure combines work flow, data exchange and negotiation tools in a secure online environment for managing the placement of individual risk, automatic and semi-automatic facultative reinsurance. Based in New York and London, the platform has topped the 100,000 mark for submissions since its founding in 1999 with tens of thousands of integrated messages distributed via XML monthly.
Download the presentation
- Kinnect, the Lloyd's of London-sponsored electronic placing system for the London market, supports the subscription process for direct and facultative reinsurance among other lines. Its managing-agent participants account for more than 60% of Lloyd's underwriting capacity of £13.7 billion (US$26.3 billion) in 2005. Also active in North American property cover, the platform has processed 500 risks and US$800 million of premium. New classes for 2005 are terrorism and international property risk.
Download the presentation
- RI3K, based in London, Singapore, and Toronto, has built a community trading platform for the P&C reinsurance industry. Covering facultative and treaty, and all classes and types of business, the platform has attracted 146 member companies worldwide and gross premium of more than US$1 billion.
Download the presentation
TOP
Show Daily for May 23
(download a PDF)
Headlines
Session coverage:
Analysts Debate: Conflicting Challenges Make it Tough to Juggle IT Priorities
Risk Manager Alert: Standards for RMs Await Implementation
Previews:
Focusing on Personal Awareness Is One Key to Informational Security
Technology Should Lead Change Effort
Agents Get Real-Time Quotes in an Instant
|
