Lloyd's run-off company Equitas has become the first company to use REPRO - a software product that converts reinsurance programmes into graphic representations.
It enables users to visualise and analyse their covers and exposures and can also be used to estimate recoveries and produce financial reports.
The software also boasts several other applications including exposure analysis for insurers and reinsurers.
REPRO, which has been developed by actuaries English Matthews Brockman in close co-operation with Equitas, enables insurers to see the full picture at a glance.
Individual contracts are converted into blocks on a year-by-year, class-by-class, layer-by-layer basis, building up an overall picture.
This enables them to highlight any gaps that there may be.
By clicking on a particular "block", the user can also examine in detail the quality as well as quantity of the cover provided.
"We needed a tool that would help us to identify specific features within reinsurance programmes, understand underwriters' reinsurance-buying strategies and help us to identify any missing protections," said Terry Onslow, head of reinsurance and pools analysis at Equitas.
He added: "REPRO enables us to do this without wading through reams of individual reinsurance contracts, and to absorb the information with confidence."
English Matthews Brockman and Equitas have been working together on REPRO over the past 15 months, and plan to continue to develop its functions, with a view to bringing out new versions in the future.
Peter Matthews, partner at English Matthews Brockman responsible for developing and marketing REPRO, said the software would have uses for a wide range of people, including underwriters, finance directors, reinsurance managers, lawyers and regulators.
Equitas was formed in 1996 to reinsure and run-off the 1992 and prior years' non-life liabilities of Lloyd's syndicates.
