Bad management, untrained staff and poor claims are undermining public perception and standards in the industry according to delegates at the `Drawing the Blueprint' debate on Thursday.
And fierce competition over price leading to unacceptable service levels could cause customers to seek insurance solutions outside the mainstream market, delegates were warned.
Groupama chairman & CEO Pierre Lefevre, AA Insurance Services managing director Andy Briscoe, IUA chairman Stephen Cane, AEGON corporate development director Laurie Edmans and Halifax General Insurance Services managing director Howard Posner rounded on the damage caused to the industry by concentrating too much on price.
Andy Briscoe said: "I wish we could find a way of getting customers to focus on other things than price. I do not know the way out of this. We need to get a value message out there.
"We have cut costs so much we do not deliver the service people expect."
A point reinforced by Howard Posner: "We need a fundamental rethink in how we deal with our customers. As soon as someone makes a claim we believe they are lying to us and we appoint a loss adjusters to try and reduce the claim."
FSA regulations led Pierre Lefevre to warn that capital proposals contained in CP 190 could drive insurers to offshore centres such as Gibraltar.
That and the government's decision not to regulate travel agents selling insurance were condemned as `inexplicable'.
But agreement broke down on the way forward for the industry. Professional qualifications for call centre staff split the panel and though all the speakers agreed that pressure to reduce prices had damaged both service and product, no ground was given in changing the philosophy.
When the major insurers were asked if they would stop demanding improved service for reduced costs from their business partners, both Lefevre and Posner had one answer: "No."

Topics