Financial & Legal expands product range

The legal expenses provider, which traditionally offered after-the-event insurance, has expanded its product range to offer an increasing number of before-the-event covers and has also developed a series of add-ons in the motor space. The rationale for broadening out from ATE is that BTE/ancillaries are annually renewable, bringing more stability and longevity to the business.

Beales, who took the role in 2020, detailed: “For BTE we have doubled our policy count up to 1.5m during the last 12 months, following the Civil Liability Act.”

The insurer is launching motor add-on covers across a variety of areas including:

• Tyres
•  Alloy wheels
• Scratch protection
• Windscreen protection
• Personal accident

“The idea of doing these was so motor brokers can offer them as an add-on,” Beales explained.

Beales said that anyone selling these products had to be regulated in their own right and, for that reason, they are not available to the appointed representative space.

Cheadle-based Financial & Legal conducted research with the broker sector in order to develop the fresh product range.

Beales, formerly CEO at UK General, added: “We now have an understanding of the market and are confident the products work for the broker space and customers.”

The proposition is set to launch this month.

Motor

The motor ancillary products are designed to suit both the personal and commercial market and will be available for customers including driving instructors and taxis. The range will also offer an excess protect product.

Beales continued: “Our preference is to work with brokers who have expertise in those areas.”

The MD also indicated that the insurer may expand into further product lines with personal possession cover including mobiles phones and gadgets but, she caveated: “We want to make sure we have sufficient resource and expertise before we move into that space.”

With the business targeting expansion, Beales detailed that non-ATE GWP is currently sitting at around £4m but the plan is to double that with BTE growth and new products. The provider is also going to be focusing on organic growth rather than M&A.

It is hoped that the new product range will develop Financial & Legal into a “one-stop-shop” for the broker space, she observed.

Adding: “We can be more flexible because we are relatively small so we have the opportunity to be more agile and give brokers a prompt response.”

The company is also looking to boost its team to bring more underwriting skills in house and is also appointing a commercial director and head of risk and regulation.

“We currently have about 26 people but we are planning to recruit in the claims team and looking at additional underwriters,” Beales explained.

Capacity

Beales also reflected on how the environment had changed in recent years pointing out that “the market has hardened and prices are going up. Capacity is tightening even more in some of our product areas, especially in specialist areas, evidenced by restrictive cover, prices going up, hardening premiums, and coverage reduced.”

She continued: “Brokers are exploring the market a little bit more following the pandemic. Accounts that have been static for a long time are re-broking, and we’ve seen a few recent examples of that in BTE and the ancillary motor space.”

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