Insurance Broker

Insurance brokers are at the heart of the insurance world. It’s a collaborative role, working with a range of businesses, organisations and individuals to share your insight into the insurance market to help find the right cover.

As an insurance broker, you need a friendly and calm approach, an interest in helping customers out and a passion for developing your knowledge in insurance.

What is an insurance broker?

An insurance broker has a strong insight into how insurance works. You will be responsible for helping to find the most appropriate cover, for the best price for various client types.

Your role is to act as a mediator between clients and offer a range of products from several insurers to ensure clients will get the best deal.

Insurance companies can vary in the type they offer from travel, and household, to motor and pet cover. The policies for individuals will differ from policies for businesses and other organisations. Individual policies tend to include travel, pet, house or motor cover. Whilst company policies cover a range of risks usually to do with damage to property and business interruption, such as employer’s liability, business travel, professional indemnity and public and product liability insurance.

Other more complex insurers cover areas from aviation to financial risks.

Responsibilities

As an insurance broker, you are responsible for your company and your clients. These are the responsibilities which will be required:

• Speak and collaborate with clients, assessing their insurance needs and risk profile.
• Educate and ensure clients are aware of their cover terms, provided in line with industry regulation.
• Strong research skills to find the best company policies and negotiate with underwriters to find the most suitable insurance cover.
• Advise clients about claims and whether they have grounds to make one on their policies.
• Organise insurance cover for numerous clients.
• Manage the annual insurance cycle including policy renewals, mid-term adjustments and planning for clients’ needs.
• Advise clients on risk management and plan new ways to prevent risks such as surveillance cameras.
• Develop relationships with new and regular clients.
• Develop relationships with various professionals including underwriters and surveyors.
• Log records and carry out numerous administrative tasks.
• Keep up to date with relevant industry changes.
• Arrange specialised insurance policies for more complex cases.
• Ensure all paperwork meets legal deadlines.
• The ability to use a computer effectively.
• Process new accounts and collect insurance premiums.

Salary

The salary for an insurance broker depends on the type of insurance company and your experience level. On average, the entry-level or trainee insurance broker's salary is around the £20,000 mark. With a couple of years of experience, the average salary can increase to around £30,000. Whilst for the most experienced insurance brokers, your salary can increase to £57,000+.

In London, the average insurance broker is significantly higher than in the rest of the UK. On average, the insurance salary is around £72,736 for experienced insurance brokers. For a junior broker salary, you can expect an average salary of £40,7771 and for seniors to earn up to £92,000+^[1].

Qualifications

A degree isn’t essential to becoming an insurance broker. Although, a degree in business, economics, finance or mathematics may be useful.

Some large insurance firms offer various graduate training schemes to enter the role. They’re competitive and typically require a 2:1 in a relevant degree, however, some may accept a 2:2. You will need to do your research on entry requirements.

Training and development

It’s possible to enter this job without a degree and start as either a junior/trainer broker role or an insurance technician. This role can help you progress higher up through experience and insurance industry qualifications such as the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). These qualifications can help you specialise in relevant insurance areas from commercial to general insurance. Qualifications can include CII Level 3 Certificate in Insurance - for trainee brokers.

Training should be provided by your employer in insurance-related legal issues to develop your knowledge. However, it’s down to you to continuously stay on top of industry news and develop your understanding of the insurance industry.

For graduate training schemes in large firms, training may be offered and these schemes typically last between 18 months to two years. They’ll provide you with experience in different work areas within the insurance industry, including client-facing and technical roles. The training includes the technical aspects of broking, whilst senior colleagues will act as your mentor as you train.

Employers will encourage you to develop your professional qualifications such as the Advanced Diploma in Insurance to enhance your understanding of insurance. Once completed and gained 5 years in the industry, you can then apply for chartered insurance broker status.

Skills

As an insurance broker, you will be expected to have various skills including the following:

• Excellent customer service skills and speaking to a wide circle of people.
• Strong written skills.
• Confident in your advice and negotiation with clients and underwriters.
• Develop relationships with clients, businesses and organisations.
• Great at paying attention to detail.
• Strong numerical, IT and administrative skills.
• Excellent at time management and working on various projects simultaneously.
• Strong team player and works well with others.
• Persistent, determined, resilient and self-motivated.
• The ability to stay calm in stressful situations and work well under pressure.
• Great with problems solving and brainstorming innovative solutions.
• The ability to use your initiative and have a flexible approach to work.
• Great understanding of how client confidentiality works.
• Commitment to your career growth and learning development.
• The ability to sell services and products.
• Use computers and their software effectively.

Work experience

If you are interested in working whilst studying, this is where an insurance professional higher apprenticeship comes in. The broker apprenticeship takes around 2 years to complete and combines workplace learning and study. There are two types of insurance broker apprenticeships including Level 3 Insurance Practitioner or Level 4 Insurance Professional apprenticeship.

The insurance broker job doesn’t require any pre-entry experience, however, any experience within an insurance company or broking house you do gain can be a benefit to your chances. Many larger insurance companies offer different work experience types including summer internship programmes or work placements to gain relevant experience. They’re tough to get into, which is why achieving a relevant degree can help you push forward in this role. For smaller firms, it’s best to contact them yourself to see if they’re offering any relevant work experience opportunities.

Work experience in other areas such as financial services, customer service, administration or legal can also be useful in your career.

Career prospects

Generally, for brokers, you will gain a few years of experience in the industry before changing your role or going into another area. Once you have gained experience, you can move into a specialist sector, progress up the ranks to management or delve into other insurance broker jobs within the industry. The specialist roles can include a claims broker, technical broker, insurance account executive, sales manager or new business development role.

Other than specialist sectors, you may specialise in specific areas of insurance such as household, aviation or motor. There’s also the option to become a manager, either for a team of brokers or across several branches. You can also go into different areas within insurance such as underwriting or compliance.

The routes are endless with an insurance broker. After several years in the industry, you can even start an insurance firm or become a director of an existing firm.