Understand how much coverage you’re purchasing and how deductibles impact your liabilities. Don’t let your brokers be complacent about the minimum insurance requirements for assets and evaluating creative program structures like deductible buydowns, deductible indemnity agreements, deductible reimbursement policies (captive), and parametric insurance (loss mitigation). Insureds with higher risk tolerances can lower premiums after reviewing for financial feasibility.

Keep up-to-date and accurate property schedules to maximize negotiations. Use cat modeling and other emerging analytics tools to structure your carrier RFP and enhance your negotiating leverage. Such resources can help estimate the likelihood of a loss, how much insurance to buy, and how much an underwriter should be charging you (most applicable to larger portfolios).

Most carriers are requiring higher replacement cost values for the assets they insure. Insureds and brokers need to confirm all assets are measured accurately. Be sure to evaluate the impacts of increasing square footage replacement costs as many months as possible before renewal.

Flooded with daily submissions, underwriters rely on data to rigorously evaluate your risk. Be sure to highlight specifics and the types of safeguards you have in place that make your property a preferred or favorable risk. When submissions are broad and incomplete, your risk will likely be put to the bottom of the pile and may not receive adequate consideration.

Both the broker and insured should have full policy forms and endorsements on file. Doing an audit of all policies ensures coverages are adequate and meet your goals. In a hard market, insurance companies will look to include endorsements and policy language that remove previously included coverages. Address all policy changes.

Work with your broker to hold stewardship meetings to keep everyone informed of current market conditions and what to expect at renewal.