Alongside various partners, including Miller, Lloyd’s have put together an insight series on how the Lloyd’s market is responding to customers’ needs post lockdown.

Providing flexible coverage in a volatile business environment

How are insurers trying to offer different risk solutions? With companies being affected by sudden changes outside of their control, they are looking for more flexible insurance cover that matches their new risk needs. 

Read the Q&A below where Jonathan Pooley from our Accident & Health team explains what some of the options are.

How can multinationals protect themselves from varying risk levels?

I think the important thing here, is that companies ensure they are receiving advice from intermediaries and third party service providers that are specialists in international business. This will ideally include specific and current knowledge of the territories most relevant to the policyholder. Of equal importance is that their insurance carrier has similar experience and knowledge. This creates a much better experience for the policyholder.

Of course, the beauty with Lloyd’s is that it’s very much a multinational market. Underwriters have a touch probably in most parts of the globe and some of the brokers that work within the market also have that multinational reach. 

How has COVID-19 changed insurers’ approach to product development for their customers?

The current circumstances have provided a real opportunity to build innovative products which can provide that vital protection for companies and generate new sources of income for the markets. Rapid and well thought through innovation is imperative in order to keep the insurance market relevant, in my opinion, to the real time issues that our clients and the companies and the people that we insure are facing today. Insurance purchasers really should expect their broker and their insurance carrier to be thinking ahead as to what their client might need in terms of products. What risk transfer options can we put together which can react to the ever changing risk landscape being faced by everybody?

How is the Lloyd’s market responding to customers’ needs?

Lloyd’s and London has a rich history of reacting to the needs of its clients and the dynamics of the global exposure environment. I think it’s fair to say that as a specialist market, Lloyds’s really aims to cover those risks, which other markets perhaps are too risk adverse to look at and the key thing there is that they react quickly and intelligently to the needs of the customers.

In terms of risk transfer some examples are: firstly voyage cancellation for ocean going vessels. Should an outbreak occur there are costs and expenses to be incurred. Secondly, the Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) has to be shipped and stored, however, there was a nervousness among many carriers to become involved, but Lloyd’s underwriters stepped up. Another connected coverage is that there was a crash in oil prices, which led to a slow down in projects and lots of plant and equipment becoming idle and simultaneously being excluded by underwriters on packages. The response was to create a dedicated Contractors Plant & Equipment facility.   

It’s really interesting because as a three hundred and thirty four year old market, Lloyds has faced its own challenges during the pandemic. We’ve always been a face to face market and we really had to adapt overnight through the use of technology, to ensure that there was continuation of trading for our customers. I think the speed and efficiency in which Lloyd’s was able to do that really is reflective of the ability for Lloyd’s to respond in a measured and considered way. In my experience, I’ve been in the market for seventeen years in Lloyd’s, and from what I’ve seen there’s really very little which we can’t do in Lloyd’s as long as we have a well thought out plan, a well thought out business case and a market demand, which clearly is there right now.