5 Trends for 2025: Underwriting Desktops

Overview

Insurers continually seek new ways to improve risk decisioning, leverage investments in technology and improve the efficiency of their key employees.? For many insurers, a new focus on introducing improved “single pane of glass” experiences have driven investment in underwriting desktop solutions, which provide key capabilities through:

-??Consolidated workflow – simplify end user experiences and “swivel chair” costs by building a single point of engagement for key underwriting resources – even in environments where multiple core policy administration platforms may exist

-??Data augmentation platform – consolidate key data augmentation to an underwriting workbench platform to provide enhanced data and real-time insight into risks

-??Bridge the analytics “last mile” – address historical challenges in bringing advances analytics and AI model insight to the front-office through integrated experiences and workflows to improve sales channel efficiency, propensity to renew, risk aggregation, etc.

Key Drivers for Underwriting Desktop Investment

For insurers investing in Underwriting Workbench solutions, we frequently see benefits cases focus on realization of Top Line Growth levers through new business optimization and increased retention, as well as through Bottom Line efficiency gains related to improved human capital workflows and simplified IT designs.

As noted below, benefits of an integrated underwriting engagement platform extend beyond traditional value drivers and help leverage parallel investments in AI, analytics, data science and resource up-skilling to shift lower value tasks to automation, AI tools or more guided workflow decisions for resources to optimize their manual workflows.

Key Capabilities & Considerations

A common challenge for insurers implementing an underwriting desktop is to establish a clear delineation between the underlying core policy administration system and the desktop itself.? Based on our experience, projects who establish these features up-front better address challenges related to scope creep and in worst case situations – duplication of features and maintenance across systems.

We view the following core capabilities best suited for the underwriting desktop, with key core policy lifecycle transactions, financial calculations and downstream integrations managed by the policy administration system.

Focus On: Geospatial & ESRI

The insurance industry has been challenged with increases in loss severity and frequency due to climate change-driven loss exposure.? Within this paradigm, leading insurers are looking to modernize their risk assessment, loss modelling and pricing to better match capital to risk – thereby improving their ability to provide coverage and address emerging coverage gaps in the marketplace.

To address these challenges, PwC has developed a suite of solutions to help insurers address their core climate exposure needs.? Powered by the ESRI ArcGIS platform, our offering includes:

???Pre-Built Visualizations – Insurance-specific dashboards and charting that provides relevant risk, peril and model output views that provide end users with an interactive and dynamic view of their underlying risks and exposures???

???Proprietary Loss Model – PwC had developed a proprietary loss model that includes both baseline and user-modifiable climate impact scenarios and time scales through 2050, allowing users to dynamically observe N-permutations of peril development based on their specific exposures and locations

???API Integration & Model Output – The climate model leverages the ESRI API platform and capabilities to integrate multiple external data providers into a single, curated offering.? Model output can be consumed by your internal systems through industry-standard RESTful integrations

???Platform for Innovation – Beyond core climate risk modeling, PwC has integrated the ESRI platform into industry platforms such as Guidewire to provide integrated visualizations and workflow at the underwriter’s desktop, and pre-built integrations support advanced products and use cases such as parametric-based insurance.

Conclusion

Investments in core system modernization, data platforms and advanced analytics have resulted in a modern foundation to build new and enhanced capabilities for underwriters.? The introduction of underwriting desktop solutions amplify these investments and bridge key workflow and insights capabilities into a single, modern experience to help drive better risk decisioning and workload prioritization.

Contributors

Imran Ilyas, Partner, Advisory Delivery Excellence Leader and Global Guidewire Leader, PwC

Matthew Wolff , Partner, Functional & Industry Technology, PwC

Dan Segura , Manager, Functional & Industry Technology, PwC

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