EXPRESS

May 2023

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Discover the CE Help Hub

Your first-class step-by-step guides on topics relating to our System, Trading with CE and Service.

We are delighted to announce the launch of our New Shop Scheme, underwritten by BRIT and Ascot. This is a major scheme release from CE in line with our strategy to develop an SME panel of insurers and become a significant player in this arena – the launch of the BRIT and Ascot facility is the first part of this delivery.

The BRIT / Ascot Shop Scheme offers a strong appetite and is very competitive in the core trades such as General Grocers, Newsagents, Off Licences and Clothing Retailers.

BRIT Syndicate 2987 at Lloyds and Ascot Syndicate 1414 at Lloyd’s to provide capacity for our Shop Scheme

This collaboration with both BRIT and Ascot where BRIT will underwrite the material damage cover and Ascot will underwrite the liability cover brings a widely recognised industry reputation and is backed by A-rated capacity.

Key Features

• Up to £3,000,000 Sums Insured Accepted
  
• Multiple Shops Accepted on one Policy
  
• Tailored Liability & Property Insurance for Shops
  
• Accidental Damage Cover is available at no additional cost
  
• Manual Work Away Cover Available
  

To find out all of the Features & Benefits including Buildings, Stock & Contents, Business Interruption, Liability Sections plus Optional Extras please click below.

Great scheme enhancements for our Contract Cleaners' product

PRODUCT IMPROVEMENT: You can now select multiple trades on our Contract Cleaners product.

The scheme has also received significant updates that will challenge any market-leading product, with reduced rates and improved features:

• Very Competitive Rates for Domestic & Commercial Cleaners
  
• FREE £1,000 Business Equipment Cover
  
• FREE £100,000 Damage to Items Worked Upon Cover
  
• FREE £30,000 Treatment Damage Cover
  
• FREE £5,000 Misuse of Telephones Cover
  
• Public & products liability up to £10,000,000 (options starting from £1,000,000)
  

Improved Let Shield RPO Policy Wording

One of the pieces of feedback we received from the recent broker survey, was the need to continually improve our schemes.

The new Let Shield policy wording, underwritten by Canopius contains several improvements.

Let Shield Cover Enhancements

Everyone is talking about the biggest event this year which is of course the Coronation of His Majesty The King and Her Majesty The Queen Consort on the 6th – 9th of May. The Coronation is one of the most significant and highly anticipated events in the British monarchy, and there will be hundreds of events across the UK to celebrate this great weekend.

The theme is The Coronation Big Lunch, where neighbours and communities across the United Kingdom are invited to share food and fun together at Coronation Big Lunches on Sunday 7th May 2023, in a nationwide act of celebration and friendship. From a cup of tea with a neighbour to a street party, a Coronation Big Lunch brings the celebrations to neighbourhoods and is a great way for everyone to get to know their community a little better.

So if your clients are holding an event, celebrating the Big Lunch or throwing a street party we can accommodate with our Single Event Insurance Product.

• Premiums Starting From Just £67 (includes IPT + Fee)
  
• Events with Up to 30,000 visitors
  
• Immediate Documents for Events that Start Within 365 Days
  

Features & Benefits

• Public Liability Cover Up to £10,000,000
  
• Products Cover for Food and Drinks
  
• Contractual Liability Cover
  
• Member to Member Liability Cover
  
• Loss or Damage to the Buildings at the Venue Cover
  

Optional Extras

• Employer’s liability up to £10,000,000
  
• Equipment Cover up to £20,000
  
• £2,500 of money cover
  

Underwriting Article - Terrorism Cover

With the first quarter of 2023 in the rear-view mirror, and the trends from 2022 hitting the headlines, I wanted to share some brief comments on the topic of Terrorism Cover; primarily, the age-old question as to the need for it, particularly for Landlords.

Terrorism Insurance can help cover the costs of property damage, interruption of business, and liability claims following a terrorist attack. At Commercial Express, we offer Terrorism as an Optional Extra on a range of policies (Commercial Property Owners, Residential Property Owners, Fast Food & Restaurant, Office, Office MD Only, Public House, Shop & Wholesale).

With the UK Terrorism National Threat Level sitting between ‘Substantial and Severe’ for the best part of the last 5 years, I’m confident this cover has been considered by many of you; particularly as policyholders may not be clear on whether they are actually required to purchase Terrorism cover. Many landlords or property managers will have mortgage and lease agreements that, for example, require insurance to cover “All Risks” (which could include Terrorism)! Even those agreements that specify perils could leave landlords needing terrorism cover; for example, if an agreement states “explosion” must be covered, according to a legal case decided in 2014, then insurance against explosions as part of a terrorist attack must be included.

When deciding whether to purchase terrorism insurance, I think landlords may focus more on the practical or commercial factors at play. For example, they may feel their property is in an area where the risk is lower, or that their property is of no significance and is, therefore, less vulnerable; and in the current climate, with prices rising and landlords under pressure to manage costs, it can be a challenge for you as brokers to reassure clients that additional costs are worthwhile.

In the event of a claim, comprehensive optional extras on a policy can be the key to a good outcome for the consumer, however, landlords must also consider whether their decision could impact their contractual obligations to keep the property adequately insured.

I am keen to hear your thoughts on how we can support you in meeting the needs of your clients, with our Terrorism offering backed by A-rated insurers and available across several product lines, we are determined to offer the consistency and scope of cover you need.

We recently sent you a survey to ask you as our valued brokers for feedback on our service and systems so that we can improve your overall experience with us. We really appreciate and value your feedback – so thank you to all the brokers who took the time to complete it and share your thoughts with us.

Whilst we are very pleased with the results, and it is a good start – as you can see below our Underwriters and Products have faired well, this now gives us the opportunity to improve areas identified such as;

• Our referral process
  
• Our need to constantly review and improve our products
  
• Potential to introduce tech such as live chat
  

We will now start to build this feedback into our development strategy with the aim to continuously measure it, and for our next survey – we would like to see our scores increase to an average of 8.5.

Commercial Express attending BIBA 2023

We are very pleased to be back at BIBA this year, following on from such a great event in 2022 we knew we couldn’t miss it. BIBA is, without doubt, the largest and most popular of all insurance industry events with some incredibly influential and inspiring speakers, including Huw Edwards as host again, and an audience with the great Sir Mo Farah CBE on day two.

Attending BIBA will once again provide us with the opportunity to meet up with our existing brokers, industry partners and at the same time establish new relationships.

At Commercial Express, one of the largest independently owned MGAs in the UK, we believe our proposition is as good or if not better than any other. Our brand, our people and our service are something we have developed and enhanced over the years. The main focus for Commercial Express is our dedication to continuous improvement within the business which has made for a very strong, experienced and robust team, with particular attention on delivering great customer service. We will continue to reduce the number of referral reasons and improve referral times but more than anything develop the knowledge and commercial awareness of our underwriters.

We believe that our 2023 product strategy also promises to deliver another big year for Commercial Express, we have already launched six products over the last year – and we continue to introduce new and market-leading products to our network of brokers, whilst at the same time continually looking to improve our current product offering. By the end of this year, we are aiming to introduce four additional capacity providers and at least six new schemes.

We would love to see you there, to talk to you about how we can help grow your business with our improved and extensive range of products and services, so if you want to partner with a market-leading MGA please do come and speak to one of our people on Stand B58.

Winners at Movo Partnership Conference

We are thrilled to announce that Commercial Express has won two prestigious awards at the Movo Partnership Conference 2023. We have been awarded the Customer Service Provider of the Year and Schemes Partner of the Year awards, recognising our commitment to providing exceptional services to our clients.

The Movo Partnership Conference is an annual event that brings together professionals from the insurance sector to showcase their services, network with peers, and gain recognition for outstanding work. We were also nominated for the Insurer Partner of the Year award, which highlights our excellence in the industry.

Our Senior Key Account Manager, Paul Ingleby, won the Customer Service Provider of the Year award, which is a testament to his dedication to providing excellent service to clients. Paul said: “I’m honoured to have won the Customer Service Provider of the Year award. At Commercial Express, we always strive to provide the best service possible to our clients, and this award recognises that effort.”

Our Managing Director, Duncan Pritchard, expressed his pride in the company’s achievement: “Winning both the Customers Service Provider of the Year and Schemes Partner of the Year awards is an incredible accomplishment, and we are thrilled to have been recognised for our dedication to our clients. We would like to extend our gratitude to the Movo Partnership for hosting such a fantastic event and giving us these prestigious awards.”

CE Learning – our Free to brokers online learning platform

CE Learning is a great resource for you, your team and your business with over 500 courses designed to help develop your skills. The platform contains courses on insurance compliance, product awareness, business skills and assessments and also provides content such as technical and regulatory modules, course leadership and management, health and safety, and communication skills.

Over the last year we have introduced 11 brand new courses including:

Residential Property Owners Insurance

Commercial Property Owners from BRIT

Optional Extras from ARAG

Public Liability (PL) Excess of Loss

FCA Regulations: Complaint Handling

Commercial Property Insurance Claims - Validation and Investigation

An Introduction to Sprinkler Systems - Module 1

Sprinkler Systems & Sprinkler Leakage Insurance - Module 2

Terrorism Insurance

Theft and Money Insurance

Weather Risks

We are about to launch two new courses on GDPR and The Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SM&CR) – meaning with this refreshed content it will ensure that you get the most up-to-date learning available in the marketplace. We are also replacing and updating many more of our courses over the coming months.

Plus we have recently changed the layout of the platform to make it easier to navigate and find everything you need.

CE Learning also enables you to find, access and track your CPD progress with interactive courses, videos, articles and features. Choose from bite-sized modules or full-length courses with our quick and simple system. You can download your achievement certificates to add to your CPD record. There is also an app which means you can learn on the go, plus you can access the website from your desktop or mobile. You can boost your learning knowledge now by downloading the app and start training on the go. The app offers an easy search facility for your CE Learning content and the ability to access it anytime/anywhere with a push of a button.

• You can download from either IOS or Android from the links at the bottom or search for ‘SAP Litmos Training’ from the App Store or Google Play.
  
• Please note when logging in for the first time enter ‘ce’ for the domain name followed by your username and password.
  

The best learning experiences are designed to progress your development and our brokers can take advantage of CE Learning completely free of charge.

We have created two new online user guides to help with any questions that our brokers may have when using our online trading platform Assist, or that Accounts may have with our Statement of Accounts system CeStatement.

Below shows the types of queries or guides that both contain and you can access them both right here.

Assist User Guide

• Creating a quote
• How to Refer a Quote
• How to Edit a Quote
• Retrieving a Quote
• Holding Cover
  

ceStatement of Account User Guide

• How to export or print your statement
• How to reconcile your account
• How to raise a query
• How to search for a policy
  

FCA Consultation: Insurance guidance for the support of customers in financial difficulty

During the pandemic, the FCA issued guidance for firms on how to respond to customers in financial difficulty due to Covid-19. At the time this guidance was only relevant to eligible complainants under DISP rules (so consumers and small businesses). In January, the FCA issued a consultation paper setting out its plans to retain this guidance however extend this to all customers of non-investment insurance products and to cover any instances of financial difficulty, not just circumstances related to the pandemic.

This change links into existing rules and principles of treating customers fairly and acting in their best interests, and will also align to the FCA’s new Principle 12 under the Consumer Duty to deliver Good Outcomes.

The FCA proposes to retain the main trigger that a firm needs to act when a customer contacts them because they are in financial difficulty, including where they are looking to cancel or reduce cover due to financial difficulty or where they are struggling to pay insurance premiums. However the FCA will extend this to note that a firm also needs to act where they identify a customer is in or likely to be in financial difficulty, and take reasonable steps to make the customer aware of and help them understand the support available to them. Particular care needs to be taken where a customer may be in vulnerable circumstances. Indicators that a customer may be in financial difficulty include missed payments, customers requesting cancellation of cover that is important to them, and any other instances where staff identify a customer as struggling.

When firms have identified a customer in financial difficulty they should consider what options they can offer when acting to deliver good outcomes and provide the customer with good outcomes focussed support that is appropriate given the characteristics of the customer. The aim is to:

• reduce the impact of the financial difficulty experienced by the customer
  
• enable the customer to maintain an appropriate level of insurance that the customer can afford, and
  
• reduce the risk of the customer losing appropriate insurance cover that is important to them
  

The FCA is proposing to retain the expectation that firms should not cancel insurance policies solely because of non-payment without first considering actions to support customers who may be in financial difficulty.

In terms of the actions the FCA expects firms to take the following are being proposed:

• Reassessing the risk profile of the customer. A customer’s risk profile may have changed since purchasing the policy. This should include consideration of whether the customer’s circumstances have changed as a result of financial difficulty and customers could potentially be offered a lower premium. For example, a motor insurance customer may have reduced their vehicle use or a struggling customer with contents insurance may have sold items covered under their insurance.
  
• Considering whether there are other products the firm can offer that would provide appropriate cover at a price the customer can afford and revising the cover accordingly. This should include considering the financial objectives of customers, and identifying where cover could be reduced or products removed. For example, a customer may no longer have a need for certain add-ons which they bought alongside a core motor or home policy. In another example, a customer in financial difficulty may be looking to switch to a cheaper product, and firms enabling this would help the customer reach their financial objective.
  
• Adjusting cover to take account of the financial change in the customer’s circumstances. This could be done on a short-term basis (affecting a period within the policy cover period) or for the longer term (affecting the remainder of the policy cover period).
  
• Working with customers to avoid the need to cancel cover that is important to them. This could include actions as part of the above or, depending on the circumstances, other actions such as providing temporary forbearance where customers pay by instalments and which do not involve the provision of regulated consumer credit or providing further information on the potential impact of the cancellation. For example, a customer who doesn’t understand the medical element of their travel insurance policy may choose to cancel their policy and travel uninsured and risk facing unaffordable medical costs. Firms should work with customers to help them understand the potential consequences of cancelling cover that is important to them.
  
• Where actions from the above result in a customer’s policy being adjusted or cancelled, firms should consider whether it is appropriate to require the customer to pay all the contractual fees or charges associated with the changes, in circumstances where not relying on these contractual provisions would be needed to provide fair treatment in the customer's best interests.
  

Alternatives to the above may include a temporary pause on the insurance rather than the cancellation or any other options that may be more appropriate. In any case, the FCA would expect to see that customers had received suitable information on the options available, in a reasonable time so they could make an informed decision, and where temporary solutions are put in place the customer's circumstances are reviewed at the end of that temporary period.

The FCA is also proposing to take forward guidance around signposting, so customers are made aware of the support available to them and which allows customers to easily contact the firm. Examples include:

• sufficiently prominent information on the firm’s general communications, such as on the firm’s website, software applications, telephone recorded messages and other channels of communication
  
• sufficiently prominent information in particular communications to customers which could be relevant to potential financial difficulties, such as communications to customers about missed payments, and
  
• making it easier for customers to contact them when they need help, by considering the different communication needs of customers (e.g. those needing to communicate through channels other than via electronic means)
  

For the full consultation please see: click here

Commercial Express Quotes Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.

Authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority - 311067.

Commercial Express Quotes Ltd is registered in England and Wales at B1 Custom House, The Waterfront, Level Street, Brierley Hill, DY5 1XH.

Company No. 03862468