COMPLEX CARGO COVERS NEED TO BE RE-THOUGHT

COMPLEX CARGO COVERS NEED TO BE RE-THOUGHT

Fiducia CEO Gerry Sheehy explains why there needs to be new thinking when it comes to solving today’s and future cargo risks.

What has become quite clear in recent months is the increasing pressure to deliver new solutions to meet the needs of high risk cargo covers.

The days when underwriters and brokers could seek to meet the needs of non-standard cargo risks without a more bespoke approach are in the past. Indeed with the complexity of the supply chain and the need to be ever more just in time when it comes to stock ordering there is a growing demand for “out of the box” solutions.

As such the current market requires experienced underwriters to redefine covers to meet the needs of owners who were transporting high value goods.

We have seen in recent weeks risks that are deemed to have additional risk attached such as tobacco and alcohol cargos that have been struggling to find cover. What has been required is the ability to think outside the box and bring together policies and capacity in different ways to meet the client’s needs.

Marine and marine cargo has traditionally been very structured in terms of the wordings and the scope of covers and it has been that reluctance to deviate from what has traditionally been offered that has created the current demands.

It has been a case of looking at other areas of the insurance industry to bring together bits of coverage that will create a new type of cover to ensure that the cargo is insured. It really is a case of thinking outside of the box.”

The solutions are there if you can move away from the standard approach but to do so you need a level of expertise and this only further highlights the need for marine insurers to retain experience and encourage the development of the next generation marine underwriters.

Risks are changing as are the demands of the clients and there is little doubt in my mind the solutions of the future will be far more agile than those we have been providing in the past.