Insurance Underwriters

Jecca (Highly likely) says

Automation is already taking the medical underwriting part out of my life and DI job duties. It is only a matter of time until there is code that gathers all online information and analytical reports regarding financials, credit scores, databases, pharmacy scans, motor vehicle reports, and criminal records. I give myself 10 years or less.

Paul (Highly likely) says

They have already announced at my company that underwriting will see significant changes in the next 5-10 years. The underwriters job will be "entirely" different within this time frame. They have told us there will be ongoing meetings and announcements regarding these changes as time goes by.

Brendan says

I am an underwriter.

There is no doubt automation will transform this job and remove the need for the underwriter defined above. There are two different types of underwriting, staff and line underwriting. Line underwriting is what is defined above, an employee who reviews applications and degree of risk on accounts on an individual basis. Staff underwriters develop guidelines and initiatives to help drive the changes in product performance . Line underwriters then follow these guidelines and initiatives.

Staff underwriting will adapt to automation and use the tools made available by it to make better decisions. You will see some reduction in this field due to ease of decision making and some of these functions will likely transfer to automation.

Another thing to consider is that is the complexity of insurance. Insurance is ever evolving based on the ever changing ways of the world. Especially in commercial insurance, there are way too many unique situations that occur on a daily basis that there is no true basic answer to based on past history, but instead require an instinctive decision by an experienced underwriter. It is highly unlikely automation will be able to adapt to these daily situations. This is how some line underwriting will survive.