60 seconds with...Mark Cassidy. Mark is a medical expenses underwriter at Brit Insurance
What, in your opinion, is the key challenge facing the insurance industry today?
Regulation. Although appropriate regulation is essential, we are in danger of having our underwriting instincts stifled by a constantly changing and ever increasing set of rules that make us find reasons not to do business. Lloyd’s was founded and made great by individuals who had an entrepreneurial business spirit. I would hate to see Lloyd’s losing this unique attribute.
Why did you decide to become an underwriter?
When I expressed a desire to become a Lloyd’s underwriter my father, who was a Lloyd’s underwriter, said ‘become a broker first, as a good broker will always make a good underwriter but not necessarily vice versa’. I started my working career as a North American Reinsurance broker at Willis Faber and Dumas. I was a broker for seven years before joining Cassidy Davis as a trainee medical underwriter. I wanted to take ‘risk’ decisions rather than persuade other people to take them.
Why did you choose to work at Lloyd's?
The simple answer is that my father was a Lloyd’s underwriter. However, when I was sixteen my school sent me on a two-day course where people from all types of industry explained what their job entailed. By the end I had decided I was only interested in insurance, and so duly became the only person I know to consciously seek a career at Lloyd’s rather than falling into it!
What do you like most about the job?
The process of negotiating terms and conditions for a risk, and the many relationships I have built up over my career. I find the cut and thrust of the daily negotiations with brokers constantly stimulating and educational, whilst I value the friendships I have built with brokers and clients over the years, based on mutual trust and respect.
What do you like least about the job?
I suppose that I have to search for the negative aspects of a risk as well as the positives. As a medical underwriter I am constantly looking at individuals’ medical records and having to make a business decision. I always try to remember that I am dealing with real people’s lives.
What's your specialty, and what made you focus on that area?
I am a Medical Expenses underwriter at Brit Insurance. This was the area I was recruited into when I joined Cassidy Davis, but I have always been interested in medicine and if I had possessed the necessary skills would have trained as a doctor.
What's the strangest thing you've ever been asked to insure?
I was once asked to insure a chain of American Funeral Directors for medical expenses in the event of corpses on its premises coming back to life. I was unsure as to whether the coverage was for the staff (for traumatic shock), or for the Lazarus-like reincarnation of the deceased, so I did not write the risk!
Your best ‘underwriting day’
There have been many memorable days and it’s hard to single one out. Those that spring to mind would include my first day as the line underwriter for the medical account at Cassidy Davis, my first day at Brit Insurance, the closure of the 1958 building - what a party that was! - and watching England regain the Ashes with some of my key brokers at the Brit Insurance Oval last September.
