ILC ARTICLE

Industry Leader Interview with Joel Goodman, Managing Director – ICAB

4th February 2021

1. What are the challenges are facing your business right now, and how are you working to overcome them? 

The challenges are twofold.

Firstly, the challenge to ensure that all of our staff are fully operational whilst working remotely, working to a high standard and maintaining a positive mental attitude. The well being of our staff is of paramount importance and we have been running regular company wide events to ensure that all staff are engaged and looked after during this very difficult time

Secondly, from a business point of view, the obstacles have been more difficult to overcome. Many hotels are closed. The ones that are open are not offering food, making what is already a stressful situation for the policyholder even more stressful. Where possible, location allowing, we have tried to book policyholders into Serviced Apartments, rather than hotels, in order that they can cook for themselves. 

2. What has been your biggest business learning from the coronavirus pandemic?

I’ve been pleasantly shocked at how our staff have been so adaptable to the current conditions. We always knew our staff were good, but this has shown us they are all fantastic!

3. As we go to a “new normal” what are you looking forward to returning to and practices will you keep?

• I’m looking forward to discussing work with my colleagues face to face, as opposed to on our “chat” groups. 

• I think as a business we will be far more flexible if an employee wishes to work from home as the past year has proven that we can do this very effectively

• Also, we have discovered that you can have a perfectly valuable meeting over Zoom or Teams, rather than travel the whole day for a 1 hour meeting, meaning that your day can be far more fulfilling and efficient.

4. If you could go back to the beginning of 2020, what piece of advice would you give to yourself?

I am far stronger than I give myself credit for. You’ve got this.

5. What would be your prediction for the industry in 2021?

From an industry wide POV I suspect that claim volumes will start to increase as and when people’s lives start to return to normal and they spend less time in their homes. It has been widely reported that many home insurance claims have been prevented by the fact that people are in their homes and can therefore act upon a peril before it gets out of hand. Also, non-urgent claims such as subsidence have been postponed as policyholders are reluctant to leave their homes and go into alternative accommodation at present. I suspect we will see a mini surge in subsidence claims as life returns to ‘normal’

From our specific POV I think there will be big changes to the alternative accommodation sector as unfortunately, there will be lots of hotels and letting agents that will no longer exist. How that pans out only time will tell, however we are confident in the robustness of our supplier database that will enable us to continue BAU