‘Attack’ stance on claims aids business continuity

Taking a proactive, or attacking, position when it comes to claims management will save you money in the long term, Helen Grimberg, partner at insurance risk and commercial law specialist BLM, and James Harvey, partner and head of office at BLM, told Airmic Today.

Business continuity is key when thinking about the reasons for being proactive. Grimberg said: “We are trying to support risk managers to know what to take back to the board to help them make the arguments they need to.”

The pair explained that, for example, when a business becomes insolvent or is going into insolvency and looking at restructuring there is a risk, but some of that can be pre-empted.

“We are seeing a consolidation of centres and when you close sites it creates risk. This can be an issue when you try to get documents to defend claims issues, but the documents are no longer there,” Harvey said.

You can’t defend a case without the relevant documents. In the same vein, once employees have left the organisation as part of a site closure, it can be difficult to get them to be witnesses in a claim defence, especially if they’re unhappy with their employer.

Subcontracting is another area suitable for a proactive approach. Risk managers are likely to run into issues if they are not carefully managing subcontractors or doing their due diligence.

Grimberg said one of the reasons people are not more proactive when it comes to claims risks is often a lack of money or resources to take proactive steps.

This is potentially a false economy. “It can also be down to people not understanding what they need to do, or not understanding the risks in the first place,” she said.