How underwriters can expedite the submission process for brokers

Underwriters can use generative AI to help speed up their turnaround times with their broker partners, says an insuretech executive.  

Underwriters can use insurtech platforms, or generative AI tools like Chat GPT, to input their submissions, along with a set of rules for prioritization, and have their AI do the sorting, Adam Cherubini, chief revenue officer at Send, a P&C insurtech, told Canadian Underwriter. 

“For example, if underwriters know they have their Top 3 favorite brokers, regardless of what risk it is, those are the ones they should be attending to,” said Cherubini. “[Gen AI can] allow them to highlight that and put that at the top of the list. [The technology] can read, if you will, all of that unstructured submission data, pull out the fact that it’s Broker 1, Broker 2, Broker 3, and those are the ones that they should be attending to.” 

Underwriters can set the priorities of their choice. For example, they can rank submissions by the total insured value, geographic location, line of business, level of risk, or whatever guidelines they choose to set.  For some underwriters, this might prove more productive than the ‘first in, first out’ approach. 

A majority of underwriters feel they don’t have enough time to build quality relationships with their top broker contacts, an industry survey suggests. A full 71% of underwriters say they don’t have enough time for communicating appetite and capacity, and another 71% say the same about receiving and sorting through submissions, according to Send’s Big Underwriting Survey 2023.

“A lot of it is just the sheer volume of submissions they’re getting,” Cherubini says. “We call it the submission chaos. When you get a submission — or you get tens of submissions in a day, or 100 a week, or whatever the case may be — the problem is, the underwriters are having a hard time discerning, ‘How do I triage all of this business?’”

Similar to a hospital, underwriters must determine the urgency of treatment for their clients. Yet, it can be difficult to do so when you’re wading through a load of tasks.

Underwriters know there’s room to automate more of the process. A full 53% say they spend the majority of their time on manual entry tasks, according to Send’s survey. 

Automation doesn’t mean brokers will have less human communication with their underwriters, Cherubini says. Rather, it will free both parties to have more effective communication. 

“If you can use technology to do all of that manual administrative work on your behalf, and free up your time to do underwriting, it allows underwriters to give back to their brokers faster and attend to them in a more professional manner,” he says. “I think brokers crave the personal access to underwriters. It gives them more confidence about their business being attended to and the way they want it to be.”   

Feature image by iStock.com/sturti