Our growth plans

Insurance Age published a press release yesterday (21.11.18) about Touchstone Underwriting’s growth plans. Here is the full story:

We have recently recruited four regional business development underwriters from Arista, MS Amlin and Allianz in a three year expansion push. The managing general agent (MGA), part of Seventeen Group which also owns James Hallam, is based out of Watford with staff in London and Chelmsford.

Growth mode

• Jo Toolan joined from MS Amlin on 5 November to target business in the north east and north west working across the Pennines.
• Andy Saxon and Kerry Champion both came on board from Arista on 15 October. Based in Bristol they have shared responsibility for Wales and the South West.
• And Paul McDermid moved across from Allianz this June to look after brokers in Scotland.

“We are in growth mode by recruiting in the regions and are looking to double in size over the next three years,” Roe told Insurance Age. “There is massive growth potential for us.” Roe explained that all four new employees were initially remote working but stated that the intention was to “set them up as hubs”.

Divisions

The MGA has four divisions with premiums ranging from £750 to hundreds of thousands of pounds.
In property and commercial it deals with non-standard property such as composite panel or timber built as well as unoccupied buildings while the hospitality and leisure section works through a hotel facility and travel and tour focuses on tour operators.

Liability and construction deals with the likes of roofers and scaffolders along with the insurance needs of companies making products for industries including heavy engineering, aviation and marine.

Specialist

Roe detailed that the MGA was “comfortable” with its current panel – Allianz, Aviva, RSA and XL Catlin – and confident of being able to manage the growth with them but noted that having reduced agencies over the years from 17 to the current four it would “never say never” to adding to the list.

Read the full article online.