Avantia Insurance is inviting brokers to team up with its new home insurance platform to sell to non-standard customers.
The homeprotect service has been developed following a successful pilot project and the company is inviting brokers and other providers to join the platform. Since the end of 2010, Avantia has been trailing homeprotect as a mainly on-line vehicle to obtain access to non-standard customers, a term that Avantia claims covers 15 per cent of the UK population.
Included in the segment are flood and subsidence risks, previously underpinned properties, ex-offenders, people with extensive claims histories, unoccupied properties, shared households, home business workers and anyone in high-risk occupations. The pilot involved a specialist non-standard underwriter and a small group of telephone-based brokers.
David Walker, chief executive of Avantia, said: “We have demonstrated that it is possible to offer non-standard insurance online, so cutting time and costs without compromising underwriting or service standards. Intelligent use of IT means we are able to provide a consistent, cost-effective underwriting service even to this supposedly difficult group of customers.