Underwriting Operations for a P&C Insurance Company

Challenge

Catastrophe Insurance (CAT) is a highly risky insurance sector owing to its policy coverage. While catastrophe losses are not new to the industry, underwriters are under constant pressure to contribute to the profitability of businesses – placing a strong emphasis on catastrophe risk management solutions. To stay ahead in this unpredictable market, businesses have to look at software and analytics solutions to implement efficient process management.

Our client is a Property and Casualty (P&C) Insurance company in the US. Their main line of business is to provide catastrophe insurance coverage, both commercial and residential, across the country. In a predominantly manual processing and paper-driven industry, the main challenge was to develop an efficient process that could manage high volumes of work. The workflow required an efficient process to create and maintain procedures, modules, job aids and other process documentation. The manual processes required highly skilled individuals that are adaptable, diligent and have a keen eye for details – making employee attrition rate a concern for the client.

Scope

In order to shorten transition timelines, a focused effort was put in getting the process documentation in place. The project’s scope included:

• Setting up a hybrid onsite-offshore team,

• Developing and implementing a thorough process documentation workflow,

• Improving employee retention rates.

Solution

To address the challenges, Mindteck developed a customized, SLA-driven production system that emphasized quality and compliance, resulting in reduced operation risk. A dedicated quality team was appointed to address the challenges and lead the process. The team was responsible for:

• Training employees to improve output quality,

• Monthly analysis of execution quality of processes,

• Random sampling and root cause analysis to identify process irregularities.

The team was able to grow tremendously; taking on 90% of the client’s underwriting operations and support critical business units. The initial investment in ramp-up and transition was recovered in under four months. To this day,  Mindteck continues to provide feedback on process improvements towards positive business outcomes. 

Outcome

• Process-driven approach ensured operational efficiency that provided cost arbitrage advantages by 35-40%,

• Resolution of staffing management through our end-to-end project management,

• Reduction in customer response time due to our SLA-driven process,

• Ensuring quality output by reducing underwriting rework,

• Real-time updates of MIS and other reports through a dedicated dashboard.