APS Summary Solutions
Very large APSs can bog down a home office underwriter and be a real productivity killer. APS summaries from IBU are an excellent way for underwriting departments to increase their production capacity.
IBU clients generally “carve out” APSs over a specified page number (such as 40-70) to be summarized by an IBU underwriter. This strategy frees up internal underwriting capacity while impacting the fewest number of cases.
One challenge of using APS summaries is getting home office underwriters comfortable using them. All IBU underwriters are former home office professionals who write and document as well as review the summary as if they were underwriting the case. They understand that the summary must not only must contain what is in the APS but also any information that is not included that would likely cause lingering questions when read by the home office underwriter.
The quality, readability as well as any inconsistencies in the APS are noted as well as MIB codes, and significant page numbers. The goal is to provide the home office underwriter with a high comfort level so they don’t feel the urge to go back and look at the APS.
It is a proven solution to keep underwriting overflow at a low variable cost while maintaining time service objectives.
Client Examples
The company receives a high frequency of very large APSs. Depending on the volume IBU is flexible to vary the page count to trigger when an APS summary is the right solution. During periods of high volume, all APSs over 40 pages are summarized; during periods of lower volume the threshold is 60 pages or higher. This strategy of flexing the use of APS summaries by page count allows this IBU client to closely match workload to available underwriting resources.
The company has multiple office locations each with small underwriting departments. They needed to add capacity but didn’t need a “whole underwriter” in any one location. IBU worked with the company to summarize all of its APSs for all locations. For each of the four offices, the cost of IBU APS summaries amounted to about one fourth the cost of a “whole underwriter.” This allowed the company to engage and pay for the exact amount of underwriting capacity needed at each location without the fixed costs of hiring additional underwriters.
Many brokerage general agents (BGAs) in the United States use IBU APS Summaries as a tool to present cases to carriers. This allows BGAs to be able to engage underwriting without have to hire an in-house underwriter. In addition to the summary, the IBU underwriter provides an assessment of the case which includes a rating. Missing or incomplete information is also noted allowing the BGA to make the best possible presentation to the home office underwriter.