Friends Life has been named a Greenwich Quality Leader for 2012 for its defined contribution corporate pensions. Greenwich Associates provides decision-makers in financial services with expert advice and Friends received the highest ratings for overall quality from 18 leading employee benefit consultants. The insurer’s managing director of corporate benefits, Colin Williams, comments:”We’re delighted that Friends [...]
JLT Specialty has launched a risk practice division following the reorganisation of its global risk solutions and regional partnership divisions. The firm provides specialist broking, risk management and claims consulting services to medium enterprises through to large and international companies, and the new division will have four key areas of focus: Communication, technology & media [...]
Major electrical retailers have offered legal undertakings to improve the way the UK’s extended warranties market works, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) reports. Competition concerns in the £1 billion per year market prompted an OFT study and the promised measures include improving the information provided to shoppers and the launch of a comparison website. [...]
In 2011, the mining insurance market was hit by $2.7 billion in natural catastrophe losses and over 60 operational losses, totaling $835 million. According to a new report from Willis, the $3.5 billion estimated losses facing mining insurers has resulted in a 30% withdrawal in insurance capacity since the start of 2011. The report estimates [...]
PartnerRe Ltd. has reported its financial results for the full-year and fourth quarter of 2011, including a quarterly net loss of $17.6m, equating to $0.49 per share. This compares to a net profit of $57m, ($0.65 per share), in the corresponding period last year and the $180.1m it made in Q3 2011. The firm also [...]
NIG, the commercial insurer, has announced the appointment of Warren Bainbridge as the new area business development manager (ABDM) for the firm’s office in Manchester. Bainbridge joins the firm from AXA, where he worked for almost two decades, most recently as North West regional director. In his new role with NIG he will assume responsibility [...]
Millions of private sector workers saving for retirement are stuck with a “hugely unfair” annuity system which cuts up to £1 billion off pension incomes every year. The claim is made in a report from the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) and the Pensions Institute at Cass Business School. The report argues that around [...]
Markel Corporation has reported its full-year financial results for 2011, including diluted net income per share of $14.60. This is just over half the $27.27 the firm made in 2010, but gross written premiums increased from $709m to $825m. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Alan I. Kirshner said that the firm’s results were affected by [...]
Liberty Mutual Insurance Europe Limited (LMIE) has announced three senior appointments to bolster its claims operations in London, Madrid and The Hague. Katie MacGregor becomes head of Claims in London, Renske Franken is appointed a claims manager in The Hague and Madrid is joined by new claims manager Ainhoa Tricas Spiteri. MacGregor will lead a [...]
Energy companies need to learn from the major loss events of the past if they are to reduce the risk of property damage losses. According to a new report from Marsh, oil and petrochemical companies have heightened the risk profile of the sector by extending their global footprints, building more capital-intensive assets and deploying more [...]
The Association of Medical Insurance Intermediaries (AMII) expresses its concerns at Defaqto’s ‘Star Ratings’ for private medical insurance (PMI) launched this week. AMII’s Chairman, Andrew Tripp said, “Our members, all of whom are specialist independent healthcare intermediaries with considerable expertise in PMI, are bemused by Defaqto’s ranking of PMI products. “For example, we do not [...]
Group income protection (GIP) claims for mental health are at their highest in the “Finance and Insurance” sector, according to Legal & General. The insurer has recently published an analysis of its GIP claims since 2000 with the figures showing that overall, 31% of claims were for mental health issues such as stress and depression, [...]
Munich Re has released its preliminary financial figures for 2011, including annual profits of €0.71bn. This is significantly less than the €2.43bn of 2010, but this is largely due to the record catastrophe losses the insurance industry suffered (US$380bn in 2011 compared to US$220bn during the previous worst year, 2005). Profit in the fourth quarter [...]
XL Group plc’s insurance segment has announced the appointment of Ian Lushington as construction underwriting manager for the UK, Ireland and Nordic region. In his new role Lushington will be based in London, and will report directly to Underwriting Manager Construction, International Property Max Benz. Lushington brings more than a quarter of a century of [...]
Responding to Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman’s comments about insurers looking for a subsidy to insure against flooding, the Association of British Insurers’ (ABI) director general, Otto Thoresen, says: “We are not arguing for a subsidy to benefit insurers. “We want a long term solution, negotiated constructively with the Government, that will help the insurance industry [...]
Standard Life is reducing some of its UK with-profits bonus rates. The life and pensions provider says most plans increased in value in the year to 1st February but guarantees are building up, and it needs to ensure its with-profits fund can meet all guarantees. The company explains: “We expect asset classes such as equities [...]
Friends Life has announced two appointments to the senior management team of its protection business. Mark Anders becomes sales and marketing director for individual protection and David Williams becomes director of group protection; both will report to Steve Payne, managing director of UK protection. Mr Anders will take up his new role at the beginning [...]
Brit Insurance has announced the appointment of John Stratton to the newly created position of chief investment officer. The appointment, which is subject to FSA approval, will see Stratton supervise the firm’s investment and asset management activities and report directly to Group Chief Executive Officer Mark Cloutier. He joins Brit from Insurance Australia Group (IAG), [...]
The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has launched a political campaign highlighting the scale of flood risk faced by constituencies across England and Wales. Quoting the latest Environment Agency flood data, the ABI claims that unfulfilled Government pledges to tackle the rising flood threat have left thousands of homes with a greater than 1 in [...]
After years of debate comes confirmation that women are better parkers than men. A month-long study by NCP took various aspects of parking including technique, accuracy and time taken, to produce a “parking coefficient” score which stands at 13.4 for women and 12.3 for men. Women excelled themselves in a number of areas including adopting [...]
