INSURANCE INTERMEDIARIES
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WHO ARE THEY?
Insurance intermediaries facilitate the placement and purchase of insurance, and provide services to insurance companies and consumers that complement the insurance placement process.
Traditionally, insurance intermediaries have been categorized as either insurance agents or insurance brokers. The distinction between the two relates to the manner in which they function in the marketplace.
THEIR ROLE
As players with both broad knowledge of the insurance marketplace, including products, prices and providers, and an acute sense of the needs of insurance purchasers, intermediaries have a unique role – indeed many roles – to play in the insurance markets in particular and, more generally, in the functioning of national and international economies.
Intermediary activity benefits the overall economy at both the national and international levels: The role of insurance in the overall health of the economy is well-understood.
RISK MANAGEMENT
Risk managers increasingly use enterprise risk management tools to allow them to understand their risk profile, identify cost drivers and analyze enterprise-wide risk.
Some intermediaries are active in providing such tools.
One of the functions of some insurance intermediaries is to help clients manage their risks, improving their risk profiles and reducing the likelihood that an insured event will occur.
CAPTIVES
Creating a captive insurance company is a popular risk-financing alternative, especially when insurance costs are high. Captives are also popular options for commercial enterprises that want to finance and control their risks.
A captive insurer is an insurance company that is wholly owned by a non-insurance organization, typically a large company or group of companies in the same business. An intermediary may help a client to establish a captive and/or manage the captive once it is up and running.