Dissatisfied with his previous insurance software provider, James Osman, CEO and Founder of Troon Underwriting, switched to Insly. In need of a system which could handle the company’s unique approach to risk, James and the team have been impressed with Insly’s flexibility, speed, and can-do approach to customer service.
“There’s nothing else like Insly on the market,” says James.
An MGA placing complex risks
Founded in 2010, Troon provides coverage for businesses spanning a range of sectors, including food and drink, leisure and entertainment, manufacturing, warehousing and wholesaling, and other specialist trades.
Having developed as a trading arm of Commercial Risks (UK) Ltd., the broker business James founded in 2002, Troon specialises in covering hard-to-place risks refused by other MGAs and brokers. The company differentiates itself on its speed of quote turnaround and use of technology to write complex risks efficiently.
“We’ve had some big companies come to us and they’ve been trying to place a risk for three weeks, and we’ve done it in a day because we’ve got better relationships and better systems,” says James.
The desire to stand out from the competition led Troon to seek a new technology partner, after encountering challenges with Troon’s previous system.
“We set up the portal because we wanted to be different to anything else on the market. Make it different, make it quick, make it good,” he says.
Searching for a tailored system for a small MGA
In 2023, James realised Troon’s underwriting software was hindering its ability to quote hard-to-place risks, quickly. Certain elements of the old system didn’t meet the team’s specific requirements or delivered a poor user experience, slowing the business down.
“We’ve dealt with companies that are not very good,” says James. “With Troon’s previous provider, issuing the papers was a nightmare, despite them working to improve it.”
Furthermore, when searching for a new provider, James found many were inflexible and wouldn’t tailor the system to Troon’s specific requirements.
“There are providers that are quite rigid,” he says. “They’ve got their system, and you’ve got to work with it, and that’s the end of it. Or they will tailor the system, but only if you’re a really big MGA. That’s bad service to me.”
A seamless experience with Insly
In contrast to his previous experiences, James has been impressed with the ease of using Insly, which enables brokers to enter customer and risk details directly into the Troon system, to generate a quote. This saves underwriters valuable time they would have spent running through risk details in person.
“The Troon portal lets you take whatever risk, property, and liability, put it in our system and we can quote it,” explains James. “It shows whether we can cover it and enables the broker to print the documents themselves.”
Insly also adds value by highlighting areas of risk, which may be harder for Troon to cover, so the team can analyse these in more detail.
“It becomes a massive tool,” continues James. “It highlights in yellow what we won’t like… plus a list at the top. It tells me if the customer is in a flood area, or a bad theft area. It tells me if a customer is on the sanctions list. All the checks that you used to have to do manually. So, we can look a bit deeper.”
And even if Troon can’t cover a particular risk, James says the portal is still valuable in delivering a London Market Submission, which can be used to approach other providers.
“We print off a London market submission from your input, so you’ve not wasted your time. And you’ve got a full submission,” explains James.
Troon also uses Insly for its finance and accounting, giving the team full visibility of all financial and performance figures, such as claims P&L, and ledgers.
Delivering efficiency and flexibility
Switching to Insly has brought significant benefits for Troon, saving employees time and enabling the business to scale with fewer staff.
“If you look at the portal, that’s four staff,” he says. “So instead of customers calling and talking to somebody, they can pull a quote from the portal.”
He has also been impressed with the flexibility of the Insly system, which has been tailored to Troon’s requirements.
“I’ve asked for it to do certain things, and the Insly team has made it happen,” he says. “So, now it does my reports the way I want them – not the way everyone else has them – because I’m used to it a certain way.”
And if Troon encounters any issues with the system, James is confident the Insly team will address them quickly and efficiently.
“We’ve got great support, so we ring them up and tell them, and they fix it,” he says.
A big future for Troon
James is optimistic about the future of Troon, which he believes has the potential to keep winning larger schemes of business that competitors can’t cover. From a technology perspective, he is keen to see how AI and other innovations will streamline operations further in the coming years.
“Troon was sluggish, but I’ve reinvented the business, and we’ve got a big future ahead of us,” he concludes.
