underwriter

claims adjuster

assistant vice president

senior underwriter

claims specialist

•	Motivate, develop and direct people as they work; evaluate performance to provide feedback and contribute to personnel decisions.
•	Organize people, tasks and activities to yield efficient work flow
•	Collaborate with people at different levels within the organization to accomplish a common goal
•	Manage multiple projects or responsibilities concurrently and effectively
•	Negotiate skillfully in tough situations with both internal and external groups to settle differences with minimum noise
•	Establish and maintain effective, trusting and respectful relationships with internal and external contacts; understand customer needs and goals and actively look for ways to meet them
•	Appropriately prioritize assigned tasks to ensure timely goal achievement.
•	Facilitate discussions and manage and resolve conflict to reconcile differences among others and between self and others.
•	Utilize strong written and oral communications; communicate information in a clear, well-organized, and professional manner
•	 Identify opportunities for process improvement and increased efficiency; consult and recommended changes and strategies to leaders.
•	Effectively present thoughts to key stakeholders to influence adoption of innovative recommendations
•	Adapt and be flexible in a complex changing environment
•	Maintain composure by responding calmly, quickly, professionally and decisively to the unpredictable or unexpected

When property is damaged and the insurance pays out, I would ensure repairs are done properly to protect the lenders interest.  I processed documents from the homeowner and issued funds as needed.  If a document was incomplete, I would call the homeowner to advise how to correct it.  Towards the end of my time there, I was transferred to a department that created letters in response to written correspondences from the homeowner.  That was a new department and only selected employees were allowed to be on this team.  This department was scrutinized by the lender and we were micro-managed.  I work well under supervision and as part of a team.  I like being held accountable for my day to ensure I am being productive. We were required to justify every minute of our day.  Unfortunately, this is not an exaggeration, I spent 30 minutes of my day compiling a minute by minute report of what my day was like.  At this point it stopped being enjoyable and feeling like a job, but it became more of a chore.  I love working and being productive and feel like I would be an asset to any company.  I just hope as I earn respect it is given to me.  I had the respect of most of the management at this company, unfortunately not my immediate supervisor.

I was a "remote" claims representative. I worked from my home for the last 14 years. There were technical challenges to overcome in the beginning with having to "raz" into the company mainframe evolving to being connected through a wireless connection. I had a large claims territory where I would have to travel to meet insureds, claimants, agents and attorneys. I particularly enjoyed the face to face meeting with them. I cultivated relationships with the agents that sold our products, they could call me and discuss claims. I could also get important information from them regarding a particular person or claim that would not be available through other means. I enjoyed attending depositions and mediation. I typically did not require the attendance of defense counsel in mediation unless there was a legal opinion that needed to be argued. I did my own arbitration contentions for Inter-company arbitration. The autonomy of being a remote adjuster was one of the best parts of the job. I worked with little supervision and maintained excellent closed file review audits.

At first I really liked working there. The pay was decent, no weekends, paid holidays, and great coworkers. Then it started to get extremely micromanaged. You couldn't even finish doing something for a customer before you get inundated with emails, instant messages, and people coming to your desk asking you why you aren't available to take the three calls that are holding. So you end up partially finishing tasks for customers and having to remember what you were supposed to do for them later in the day when you were "allowed" to finish all of your unfinished tasks. Even though we were always in the 90% range for service level and the goal was 80%.  The systems are of poor quality, unintuitive, and are constantly going down or not working properly. Training, well, you process returned mail and do mortgagee changes. The rest, you'll basically learn as you go, and if you need help - check the call guide, because it's in there somewhere. There is no room to move up in the customer service center, and no confidence that your job will be there tomorrow.

Respond to agents emails and coverage questions, work on renewals, amendments, endorsements and quote new business with the proper rate.

I learned how to properly evaluate and analyze accord applications to see if the risk fits into the company guidelines and price the account to maintain profitability.

Management was not very hands on and hard to work with since the majority of the time they were in meetings.

Utilized co-workers when needed and worked together as an underwriting team to solve complex problems and run ideas past each other to get separate views on underwriting issues.

The hardest part of the job was the amount of work that needed to be completed with a limited number of staff for the amount of premium each underwriter was assigned with.

The most enjoyable part of the job were the people I worked with and the relationships that were built personally and professionally.

My days at QBE were never "typical."  There was always something new, exciting and there was always the ever present notion to put out a fire or 3 within the week.  I learned a great deal from my experiences within the QBE walls, ranging from gaining knowledge in Management, Leadership, Technical skills, Networking, Business Acumen, Sales & Marketing, Training, Public Speaking, Hazard Insurance & Taxes, Human Resources & Compliance to name a few.  The most challenging part of my job was balancing my workload to try fulfill the needs of my manager, peers, team, indirect reports, internal/external clients as well as the needs of my own.  I wasn't always successful with this but I gave it a valiant effort each day.  The most enjoyable part of my job was doing all I could to help my customers and company.  Whether I or my team was rewarded with a bonus, raise, award, compliment or simply a smile, I deemed our efforts a success.  I thoroughly enjoyed my experience at QBE and I plan to utilize it's teachings throughout the rest of my years.

QBE is the worst company I've worked for in my 10-year career, most importantly due to constant turnover, repetitive reorganizations that only benefit tenured leaders, brokers making overworked underwriters quote submissions that should be in the E & S market, a poorly managed book that hasn’t made a North American UW profit in several years, and an operation that goes in and out of markets and changes appetites like every three years. 

Don’t be fooled by the high salary, it’s being paid by investment income. Nobody stays here for more than 2-3 years, and there's a strong reason for it.  Constant turnover, lack of strategy, service culture, brand reputation, and repetitive reorganizations made it a transactional and demotivating work environment.  I would highly encourage you to move forward with another company, at least in North America.




QBE will get you in the door with a high salary, but that comes with massive tradeoffs.  First, the company's North America operation is wildly unprofitable, and there's no reason to believe that will change anytime soon, so the bonuses will reflect their poorly managed book.  Brokers will not take you seriously unless you are writing accounts for them that belong in the excess markets.
Management will find ways to blame you for things you have no control over, including accounts that you haven't worked.  Management is under pressure from Australia as the North America unit is unprofitable, so they put ungodly pressure on underwriters with unclear goals or direction.  Management at QBE is unlike anything you can imagine.    We are on our 3rd CEO in less than 2 years, and every level of management below that has changed hands a few times in less than 2 years.  Nobody stays here for more than 2-3 years, and there's a strong reason for it.

A typical day at work includes running reports, processing insurance claims, reviewing time sheets for each employee, verifying documents before scanning them into the system, and accounting for all live checks.  I have gained much knowledge for the business in handling escalated situations, processing claims for borrowers, and understanding the importance of quality and productivity.  The hardest part of the job is having to record the errors received daily by my co-workers, which requires additional coaching.  There is some area of improvement for management, especially having to approach them with questions.  What I have gained from management is constructive criticism and how to evolve as a person.  It is very enjoyable working with all of my co- workers, as we all have been through difficult times.  There is a lot of respect within our department, and everyone is able to talk about issues.

Compensation was higher than most companies, After working with the company for the higher compensation was understandable, High work loads made it difficult to keep up with performance expectations without putting in long hours everyday, This was the hardest part of the job, not being able to meet my personal standards no matter how much time was invested, The best part about the job was the co-workers, They were dedicated and did their best to make the company profitable, My direct manager was not easily accessible as located at the home office in another state, I received excellent performance evaluations each year, However I was layed off after 9-1/2 years with the company due to my inability to relocate to the state the home office and direct manager were located in.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Underwriter 18 salaries reported	$31.25 per hour
Claims adjuster 4 salaries reported	$68,000 per year
Assistant vice president 15 salaries reported	$177,817 per year
Senior underwriter 7 salaries reported	$94,393 per year
Claims specialist 6 salaries reported	$116,500 per year

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