Yiannis Kotoulas reviews the news

This week we spoke to Yiannis Kotoulas, news editor at Insurance Times, to get his take on the past week in insurance news.

What has been the stand-out story for you in the insurance market this week and why?

As the cost of living crisis tightens its grip on the country, news that Direct Line is to launch a basic, tailored car insurance policy for struggling customers pricked my ears up.

The tailored product, to be launched under the Churchill brand, will give customers a cheaper option of protecting their vehicles and help manage costs at a time when insureds are already cutting back on cover and risking underinsurance.

Personal finance company NerdWallet recently revealed that home and motor were the lines where customers had cut back their cover levels the most, while GlobalData showed that 4.8% of surveyed consumers had already cancelled their home insurance.

The insurance sector must listen to insureds as they cry out for cheaper options for cover. In a perfect world, customers would be able to afford the best protection possible, but where they can’t, the industry must provide solutions that enable them to remain protected while not breaking the bank.

Who is your insurance personality of the week and why?

I have to give a special shout out to Branko Bjelobaba – Branko has remained steadfast in his opinion that malpractice in the industry should be called out and stamped out.

He has refused to be silenced on a range of important issues including the FCA’s Consumer Duty, property insurance commission disclosures and the real essence of what ‘fair value’ is for the sector’s end customers.

As a compliance consultant, Branko could be forgiven for providing firms with the minimum of advice that would see them evade the regulator’s attention, but his keen sense of fairness (and his proclivity for a fiery quote in the press) sees him really aim to help insurance firms remember their purpose.

Which news this week do you think will have the most long-term impact on the insurance profession?

We recently reported on the influx of new capital that is lining up to invest in and provide capacity for MGAs – wider financial markets outside of insurance are sitting up and taking notice of the growing influence of this specific sector and there currently seems to be no stopper on its growth.

Speaking at Insurance Times’ Broker CEO Forum last month, some panellists questioned the continued relevance of insurers in the future and asked whether they would slowly morph into something akin to reinsurers that simply provide capacity for MGAs to underwrite more efficiently.

Speaking to people within the market, there seems to be an aura about the growth of MGAs that is attracting ever growing interest – one expert even questioned whether Lloyd’s should aim to transform itself into a marketplace for MGAs.

Whether or not this growth is sustainable, MGAs are now intimately tied up with the insurance sector and everyone would do well to keep a close eye on this development.

If you could interview anyone from the world of insurance and they had to answer your question 100% truthfully, who would it be and what would you ask them?

Less a specific person, but with the collapse of the almost entirely unregulated FTX cryptocurrency exchange this week, I’d like to ask anyone in insurance that had considered providing cover for NFTs, cryptocurrency or other unregulated virtual assets one question: “Really?”

If you could wave a magic wand and change one thing about our industry, what would it be?

In my, admittedly short, nine months in the insurance sector, I am still yet to meet someone that doesn’t fit the stereotype of having accidentally fallen into insurance as a career.

If I could wave a magic wand, I’d use it to convince young people that the industry is a lot more interesting, friendly and dynamic than popular perceptions might have them believe.

The recruitment problems insurance is seeing are regrettable and based on a somewhat poor public image – but maybe we don’t need a magic wand to address that?

Finally, would you survive a zombie apocalypse?

Without trying to sound like I’ve thought about this before… I always think the answer depends on the exact form of zombie apocalypse we’re hypothetically facing.

Are we encountering hordes of fast-moving undead á la 28 Days Later or I Am Legend, or are we coming against a slow, mindless, shuffling gaggle of dribblers like the crew of The Walking Dead?

In the prior situation? No chance. But in the latter? I’d thrive while following Jesse Eisenberg’s #1 rule in Zombieland: Cardio – zombies aren’t fast. To escape, it’s more important to be able to run longer than faster.

Maybe I should start running again…