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Opinion

Broker Not Talking Your Language? Here Are Your Options

Only hear from your broker around renewal dates? When’s the last time they asked where your business is heading, or whether your existing cover is fit for purpose? Do they know what it’s like to grow fast?

If you feel like you just aren’t on the same page, you’ve got two options. One, wait until renewal and get quotes from different brokers – a process that typically duplicates work for you. Or two, sign a ‘Letter of Appointment’ (LoA) with an insurance partner that gets it, at any point in the year, in a matter of seconds. The best bit? It won’t cost a penny or take up any time.

For scale-ups (or any business for that matter), option two tends to work best. But not many people know it exists. Here’s why it’s worth considering…

Why switch?

You might not necessarily have the wrong policies, or even the wrong insurers – it’s just that your broker doesn’t proactively manage your current cover. The likelihood is they don’t keep tabs on your movements – like getting investment, hiring staff, or expanding into fresh markets – and therefore can’t know whether your policies still serve your best interests.

As a scale-up, you can’t afford to have a broker who doesn’t understand you. It costs too much in the long run – both in real terms as well as the risk to your organisation. Not only will premiums creep up over time, but you could find yourself underinsured as you grow – or worse, with no cover at all on new areas of your business.

It’s worth remembering that all this drains your productivity too. By eating into your time, dealing with insurance takes away from what really matters: growing your company. The right partner will give you that time back.

So, if your broker is only contacting you annually and doesn’t fully grasp the nature of your business, don’t sit around and wait for your insurance to come up for renewal. Not sure if that’s your broker? Ask yourself when they last contacted you in advance of an event in your business, rather than reacting to changes you told them needed to be made.

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What can a proactive insurance partner do?

Insurance partners like Capsule will make sure you’re in the right place cover-wise at every stage of your journey. And to appoint us, you only need to digitally sign a letter. We’ll even handle the transition from your old broker – it’ll feel just like switching energy suppliers.

But think of this as an evolution, not a revolution – especially if you’re happy with your policies. We’ll work in the background, initially making sure you have everything in place. We can then make gradual and necessary improvements to your insurance programme while we prepare to run an ‘open market’ process ahead of the upcoming renewal. This ensures you’re with the best insurer, on the best terms, and paying the best price.

We’ll also:

> Check you’re properly covered, both now and ahead of future risks

> Bring all renewal dates into one common date

> Consolidate insurers where possible and appropriate

> Match you with insurers that fit your values and ambition

> Remove admin, such as hand-written proposal forms

Issuing an LoA keeps your insurers on their toes too. It sends a clear message that you’re taking your cover seriously: either they provide a better deal, or we’ll take your business elsewhere. And that means you can often reduce insurance spend as a proportion of your turnover over time. No more creeping costs.

Oh, and did we mention that we’ll act for free until renewal? We take our commission from the insurer when a policy is purchased or renewed. While your premiums will stay the same at first, we’ll immediately get to work exploring the market and finding ways to bring down your costs when the term ends – and we won’t charge you for doing so.

Get insurance confident

Capsule knows what the scale-up process involves, and we leverage our own experience of it to improve your policies, negotiate with insurers, and keep you protected as you grow. It’s what turns insurance from a headache into one less thing to think about.

Switching to us takes seconds – literally, just an electronic signature on a letter. Contact us today, and we’ll do the rest.

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Capsule Insurance Services Limited t/a Capsule are an Appointed Representative of James Hallam Limited who are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), under Firm Reference Number (FRN) 134435. Capsule's FRN is 948838. Registered in England and Wales company number: 13340821. Registered office is 48 Belle Vue Terrace, Malvern, England WR14 4QG.

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