Daily briefing: Wednesday - ABI plays favourites

Let’s face it, the ABI has endured some big problems over the last couple of years, and it’s not doing much to help itself.

Today we learn that legal expenses insurer Elite has quit the ABI, following the footsteps of DAS, which left last October.

Elite has fired off some harsh words at the ABI, saying that it’s not interested in legal expenses insurers and has not stepped up to the plate over the Jackson Review.

Choosing its battles

The ABI has decided to represent its core interests on Jackson, but to be fair to the legal expenses insurers, you can understand why they’re upset.

I can’t remember the ABI, at any moment, saying anything of note that is supportive of the legal expenses sector over Jackson.

But, then again, we are talking about an organisation that has displayed a certain level of dysfunctional behaviour in recent years.

Lost without a leader?

The ABI director-general Kerrie Kelly suddenly quit in July last year, having only been in the post for just six months, with the trade body claiming she left for ‘personal reasons’.

That was an embarrassment for the ABI, but to make matters worse it took another eight months to find a replacement in Otto Thoresen.

That meant the ABI was rudderless at the very top when one of the biggest issues in years hit the insurance industry, namely the European Court of Justice's ruling that banned gender pricing in underwriting on discrimination grounds.

When Insurance Times first picked up the story, phoning round its contacts, there was a distinct lack of knowledge about the gender ruling and what it could mean for the insurance industry. Perhaps there was a lack of a communication from the ABI in the run-up to the judgment?

Out of order

Communication skills have never been one of the ABI’s great strengths.

The association consistently riles journalists by dropping stories to its favourites for perceived maximum impact.

That’s not a strategy endorsed by Chartered Institute of Public Relations, which says that separate embargoes – permission to publish a press release at a certain time – for different media is poor practice.

No, it has not been a great time of late for the ABI: leadership problems at the top, falling out with legal expenses insurers and questionable communications strategies.

Otto Thoresen bemoans today that the reputation of the insurance industry among the public is "not high". A good start to solving that problem would be to get its own house in order once and for all.

Saxon East is assistant editor, news.