Your insurer pulls out of the class: remarketing the book without losing the clients

Contents

1. It is still a renewal, even though the insurer changed
2. And it is also a fresh demands-and-needs exercise
3. What actually changes for the client
4. A sixty-day plan that keeps the book
5. Say the difficult part first
6. Running the batch without losing the thread
7. Frequently asked questions

The email lands in March. Your insurer is withdrawing from the class with effect from 1 July, and the sixty policies renewing after that date will not be invited. Nobody has complained, no adviser has done anything wrong, and yet a block of your book is suddenly at risk — because the moment a client has to read a new schedule and sign something new, they start wondering what else is out there.

Handled badly, a capacity withdrawal is a retention event disguised as an administrative one. Handled properly, it is one of the few moments where a broker visibly earns the fee. The difference is mostly in the first ten days.

It is still a renewal, even though the insurer changed

This is the point firms most often get wrong, and it costs them in file reviews. ICOBS 6.5.1R(2) defines renewal as « carrying forward a policy, at the point of expiry and as a successive or separate operation of the same nature and duration as the policy, with the same insurance intermediary or the same insurer ». Read the last clause slowly: it is or, not and. If you remain the intermediary and carry the cover forward at expiry, the renewal rules can bite even though the risk has moved to a completely different carrier.

Where the section applies — a general insurance contract with a consumer, not a group policy, duration of ten months or more — that means the familiar obligations do not disappear because you changed insurer:

1. Disclosing the premium for the policy you propose to renew, as set at its inception, presented so the client can compare it with the new figure (ICOBS 6.5.1R(3)(b)(i)).
2. Using the adjusted comparator where there has been a mid-term change, annualised and excluding associated fees (ICOBS 6.5.1R(3)(b)(ii)).
3. Including the shop-around statement at the fourth and each subsequent renewal (ICOBS 6.5.1R(4)) — the one that begins « You have been with us a number of years ».

Whether a specific placement is a renewal or a genuinely new contract is a judgement on the facts, and it is worth having compliance write the position down once for the affected batch rather than leaving sixty advisers to decide individually. What you should not do is assume that a new insurer means a clean sheet. We covered the underlying disclosure mechanics in our guide to ICOBS 6.5 renewal notices and retention.

And it is also a fresh demands-and-needs exercise

The cover is not the cover the client bought. Wording, exclusions, excesses, claims handling and sometimes the insurer’s financial standing have all changed. ICOBS 5.2.2R requires you to specify the client’s demands and needs on the basis of information obtained from them, and ICOBS 5.2.2DR is blunt that the sale of a contract of insurance must always be accompanied by a demands and needs test. ICOBS 5.2.2BR adds that what you propose must be consistent with those demands and needs, advised or not.

In practice: do not recycle last year’s statement with a new policy number pasted in. Re-ask the questions that the new wording makes material — occupancy, business use, sum insured, any conditions precedent the previous insurer did not impose. Our note on demands and needs when you sell over WhatsApp covers how to evidence that on a messaging channel.

What actually changes for the client

What the client sees	Usually changes	What you must say out loud
Insurer name and policy number	Yes	Say it in the first line, not on page four
Premium	Often, and rarely downwards	Show last year’s figure alongside, as the rules require
Wording, exclusions, conditions	Yes	Name the two or three differences that would change a claim
Excess	Frequently	State the new figure explicitly, per section
Claims notification route	Yes	Give the new number before it is needed, not after
Premium finance agreement	Yes — a new credit agreement	Do not let it auto-carry in the client’s mind
Continuity of cover	Should not	Confirm the date and time cover incepts

A sixty-day plan that keeps the book

1. Day 0, the notice arrives. Pull the exact list of affected policies with renewal dates. Do not work from memory of who was on that scheme.
2. Day 1 to 3, agree the line. One version of what happened and why, written down, so every adviser says the same thing. Silence here is what produces sixty improvised explanations.
3. Day 3 to 10, contact the top of the book first. Largest premiums and most complex risks get a call, not a message. Everyone else gets a short heads-up that a change is coming and that you are already on it.
4. Day 10 to 30, go to market. Two or three viable alternatives, with the differences documented as you go rather than reconstructed later.
5. Day 30, agree the compliance position for the batch: renewal or new contract, what disclosure pack goes out, which statement each client needs.
6. Day 30 to 45, issue terms early. Time is the retention lever. A client with three weeks reads; a client with four days shops.
7. Day 45 to 55, chase the non-responders on the channel they actually use, and log every attempt. The pattern is the same as any renewal chase — see our sixty-day commercial renewal playbook.
8. After inception, close the loop. Confirm cover in force, send the new claims route again, and diarise a call at ninety days. That call is where next year’s renewal is won.

Say the difficult part first

The instinct is to lead with reassurance and bury the narrowing of cover in an attachment. It is exactly the wrong instinct. Under the Consumer Duty, consumer understanding and avoiding foreseeable harm point the same way: the client should be able to see, quickly, what is different and what it means for them. A client who discovers a new exclusion at claim stage does not file a complaint about the exclusion — they file it about you.

Practically, that means a short summary in plain language, the two or three material differences named, the full documents attached, and confirmation sent in a form the client can keep and reproduce. Messaging is fine as the conversation; the record has to satisfy the durable medium test. Keep both.

Running the batch without losing the thread

Sixty policies moving at once is where spreadsheets fail — not because the list is hard, but because the replies are. In ORIS the affected clients go in as a segment, imported from CSV or filtered on policy type and renewal window, and the first notice goes out as an approved utility template through Quick Campaign. Replies come back into a shared inbox rather than six personal phones. Incoming messages are classified, so « what do you mean it is a different insurer » raises an attrition-risk flag and a draft rather than sitting unread, and anything negative escalates to a human by design. Progress exports to CSV for the file. There is no policy administration behind it and no document issuance — the schedules still come from the insurer — but nobody has to reconstruct on 30 June who was told what in April. The full renewal sequence is set out in our policy renewal use case.

Frequently asked questions

If we move the client to a new insurer, do the ICOBS 6.5 renewal disclosures still apply?

Often yes. The definition in ICOBS 6.5.1R(2) refers to carrying the policy forward with the same intermediary or the same insurer, so remaining the broker can be enough to keep the transaction within the section where the other conditions are met. Get your compliance function to record the position for the batch, in writing, before the notices go out.

How much notice does an insurer have to give before withdrawing capacity?

There is no single conduct rule that fixes a notice period to the broker for a class exit; what governs it is your agency or binder agreement and the notice provisions in it. Read that document rather than assuming a market convention. Your obligations to the client at renewal, by contrast, are fixed by the rules and do not flex because the insurer gave you three weeks.

Should we tell clients the insurer pulled out, or just present the new terms?

Tell them. It is the truthful explanation for a change they will notice anyway, it removes the suspicion that you moved the risk for your own benefit, and it positions the work you did. Presenting new terms with no explanation is how a routine remarketing turns into a conversation about switching brokers.

Can we use the batch as a cross-selling opportunity?

Handle the placement first and cleanly. Once cover is confirmed and the client is settled, a review conversation is legitimate and often welcome — the household or the business has just been reminded that insurance is not automatic. Mixing an upsell into the notice itself muddies the disclosure and reads as opportunistic.

What if a client cannot be placed at all?

Say so early and in writing, set out what you tried, and point them to alternatives including specialist markets or a broker with different access. Leaving it to the last week so that the client discovers the gap themselves is the version that becomes a complaint, and the file will show exactly when you knew.