As tens of thousands of brokers and insurers gathered in Manchester one leading underwriter has said brokers are facing a growing challenge when it comes to the core liability issues for SME and midmarket clients.

Speaking at the Biba annual conference, founder and CEO of specialist financial lines MGA, Kayzen, Charles Boorman, told Emerging Risks the ongoing issues around the sale of management liability coverage will be a key discussion during the three-day event.

Management liability policies provide directors & officers (D&O), employment practice liability, corporate liability, and employee crime in a wraparound cover and Boorman said the product, while significantly important to business, does not get the attention it requires or deserves given it remains a small part of the commercial insurance spend.

“The state of the market is always a topic at the conference he explained. “And generally, we are all moaning about it.

“Management liability cover and the difficulties of selling the products have been a topic and there is a great deal of discussion around how we can drive sales given its importance to the SME and mid-market sectors.

“It is not a cover that you will see PLCs purchase but in a risk environment where the operators of companies are under increasing scrutiny it has risen its importance.”

He added: “As my colleague describes it this is a product that protects the businesses which are the heart and soul of the UK economy.

“The issue we have it that when taken across the broader insurance spend it is not a significant cost. It is competitively priced, but it has to be remembered that D&O will protect the personal assets of the company’s  leaders and as such it is an important cover.”

Boorman said as with any liability risk they are complex and in many ways the brokers are not specialists and as such are reluctant to push a product they may not fully understand.

“The sale of these products in the regions will be done by brokers who in the vast majority of cases are generalists,” he continued. “They sell property, motor, cyber, PI and liability. They cannot be expected to be experts in every area of the market.

“I was lucky to start my D&O career in London where I worked alongside specialists in D&O. Also, very few workers are now in the office five days a week so for the next generation the ability to learn from experienced co-workers is now not as easy as it has been.”

As such Boorman said more needed to the done.

“We are increasingly seeing management liability cover on the online quotation engines,” he explained. “It makes the cover look simplistic and commoditised.

“If a broker has a client which is in financial lines, another in pharmaceuticals, another in healthcare and another in construction they all have different risks when it comes to management liability and need to have the right cover for those risks.

“In many ways we need to be more supportive and for want of a better phrase hold the broker’s hand at point of sale to create greater confidence.”