A new e-trading facility has been introduced by Guy Carpenter’s facultative arm, GCFac, which will allow brokers in Latin and North America to deal with Lloyd’s insurer Hiscox directly online.
STEALTH (which stands for Sabotage and Terrorism Electronic Application Linked to Hiscox) is a unique end to end facility for Latin America which will be launched in Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Venezuela, Argentina and Miami.
Erik Lakatos, broker at GCFac, is in London on a six-month secondment from Peru to oversee the launch. “For a while now we have been investigating the potential of e-trading and e-commerce,” he says. “The technological climate prevalent now allows for e-insurance to occur. We wanted to apply it to facultative business, and our terrorism accounts seemed like the ideal place to begin.”
The facility caters for political risks, such as riots, strikes, civil commotions, and malicious damage including sabotage and terrorism, in specific Latin American countries.
Lakatos explains that, while terrorism accounts may be smaller in premium in Latin America when compared with the US or Europe, the volume, exposure and opportunity is there.
He adds: “Latin America is very much a primary market for us. It is a volatile area and, because we have eight Guy Carpenter offices in the region, it makes sense to concentrate our efforts there at first.”
Speed of service, ease of use and compliance are the facility’s main strengths. “At its simplest level, if we receive a submission, we can send it directly to a Hiscox underwriter. They can print out the submission, analyse the risk and reply to us in under ten minutes with a quote,” explains Lakatos.
“It’s compliant with FSA regulations and every aspect of the facility is undertaken in a controlled environment. We eventually hope to build up different risks other than terrorism in the same way and in new territories.”
Stephen Ashwell, war terrorism and political violence underwriter at Hiscox, commented: “We are one of the Lloyd’s leads in terrorism risk. As the market has evolved we have always tried to stay ahead of the game.
“Guy Carpenter came to us earlier this year and explained that there was a large amount of small business in their Latin American offices that was difficult for them to handle and place in the traditional way because of premium volumes and so on. They asked us if we would be prepared to help them with the STEALTH system.”
He adds: “It’s a system that is very user friendly which is the key to making this sort of transaction work. I have no doubt it will enhance our small business work throughout Latin America and Guy Carpenter offices around the world.
Ron Whyte, Head of GCFac Worldwide said of the new facility: “This is a great example of how to go about electronic trading. Start in a small manageable way and learn. This facility is totally scaleable and we’ll be looking to extend to other lines and territories in due course.”
For more information about this product contact:
Erik Lakatos
Tel: +44(0) 207 357 3943
Ron Whyte
Head of GCFac Worldwide
Tel: +44(0) 207 357 3983
