Galleon at Markel

It is incredible to think that, on November 1, it will be a year since the Galleon team became part of Markel.

It has been a very smooth integration indeed with Galleon forming an important part of the marine liability team headed up by Andrew Carter.

Galleon specialises in providing marine professional indemnity cover for clients operating as a ship manager, surveyor, consultant, naval architect, ship agent and similar as well as cargo liability cover for those clients operating as a logistics provider, ocean and air freight forwarder, road and rail transporter, warehouse operator, customs agent and related activities.

It continues to operate as an underwriting agency with a total available market capacity in excess of $100m, although typical policy limits are less than $10m.

The year has been a challenging one, with strong competition fuelled by market overcapacity, but nevertheless Galleon has coped well and managed to steadily increase its market share and, at the same time, maintain stringent underwriting standards.

The underwriting team has recently expanded with Tom Batterbury joining from CNA Hardy. He brings a refreshing and level-headed approach and is proving to be a strong asset to the existing team.

In conjunction with this expansion, James Munn, senior underwriter, will provide additional underwriting support to the existing ports and terminals team.

As part of our larger marine business, the Galleon team now has a much broader range of products to offer its brokers and their clients with a broader geographic reach to local brokers in a number of regions through Markel’s offices in the USA, South America, Singapore and Europe.

The Galleon team also believes that it is now seeing business that previously would not have been presented to it. Chris Curran, senior underwriter, said: “Historically, brokers would only come to us with businesses that mapped directly on to our appetite, but now that we have the capability to offer a wider portfolio of covers so we do see more opportunities.”

He adds: “Our market position has grown and the bigger brokers are increasingly comfortable with the strength that we have gained from being part of Markel. Over the year our broker base has increased by approximately 15% and that’s a major step in the ability to grow our business.”

Originally posted on http://www.markelinternational.com