For brokers, the complaints about underwriters are familiar: black-box decisions, poor feedback on declined risks, legacy systems at larger insurers and claims that can drag on for years. Add a 24 to 48 hour turnaround culture, AI-fuelled expectations of instant service and clients who want cover bound almost immediately, and the broker-underwriter relationship starts to look less like a partnership and more like a pressure test. That is exactly why it is worth assessing the state of the relationship now: not simply to ask whether underwriters are performing, but whether the structure around them still allows brokers and carriers to work well together.
Beyond the well-known broker gripes about the big insurers and their sometimes clunky and labour intensive legacy systems, the difficulties involving brokers and underwriters tend to revolve around external pressures impacting their relationship.
James Still (pictured), managing director of Still Insured Insurance Brokers, has a view that could be more sympathetic to underwriters than many brokers might expect. His central argument is that underwriting standards are not the main weakness; the real strain lies in how risks are presented, how quickly everyone is forced to work and how much collaboration has fallen away. His perspective points to a relationship under operational stress.
Still argues that brokers should be careful about blaming underwriters for outcomes that begin with poor submissions. In his telling, underwriters perform best when they are given a properly structured story about the risk rather than fragments, omissions or rushed proposal forms. That is particularly relevant in more complex placements, where he said outcomes improve materially when a broker explains the business, the controls and the risk management context in full.
“The best underwriters are risk strategists,” he said.
He said that underwriters are not merely pricing individual policies but balancing portfolios, spotting emerging risks and protecting long-term sustainability in a period shaped by catastrophe losses and inflation. For brokers frustrated by hardening terms or conservative appetite, that is an important reminder: underwriting discipline may be unpopular, but it is not arbitrary.
Still’s strongest criticism is that where brokers do have problems with underwriters, it’s usually not for want of technical capability but more because of a lack of communication. Brokers, he said, too often receive a decline or unattractive terms with little explanation. That deprives them of the chance to improve the submission, educate the client or salvage a complex risk through dialogue.
Today’s need for speed is also a challenge for the broker-underwriter relationship, said Still.
“Fast doesn’t mean good. Generally, fast means rushed,” he said.
This explains why tensions persist even when both sides are doing their jobs. Still said that what once allowed for proper analysis over seven business days is now routinely expected within 24 to 48 hours. In that environment, sloppy proposals are more likely, bad terms are more likely and both broker and underwriter are left operating defensively.
Still draws a contrast between agile MGAs and larger insurers. He said smaller players are setting the standard on responsiveness and collaboration while major carriers are still wrestling with legacy systems and offshore claims handling.
“I’ve had multiple claims sitting on my desk with one particular underwriter, for nearly two, two and a half years that are still unresolved,” said Still.
This is the likely a departure point for Still’s analysis of the broker-underwriter relationship. Brokers like Still may admire underwriting discipline but they will not stay patient with service failures that leave clients “high and dry” at claim time.
This comes back to the relationship between these industry stalwarts.
“From a broking perspective, the biggest opportunity in a broking-underwriting relationship is communication and collaboration,” he said.
So when the broker-underwriter relationship is under strain it could be because speed has outpaced process, service has not kept up with expectations and the feedback loop between broker and underwriter has thinned out just when the market most needs it.
