Lancashire makes up to nine redundancies at London office

Lancashire Holdings has made between seven and nine redundancies in its London office after deciding to pull out of property direct and facultative lines.

Lancashire Group chief executive Richard Brindle said at the release of the company’s first half 2012 results that the insurer stopped writing the business last year as a result of volatile loss ratios and “consistently depressed” pricing.

“The loss ratios in these classes were proving volatile, and the risk pricing was consistently depressed, making it inefficient for Lancashire to continue to deploy capital in supporting these lines, particularly in view of other more attractive underwriting opportunities,” he said.

A Lancashire spokesman said: “This unfortunately resulted in a number of redundancies in the Group’s operating subsidiary in London.

“Lancashire Insurance Company Ltd (LICL) ceased underwriting D&F business in 2011. LICL remains the reinsurance arm of the Lancashire Group and currently employs 38 people in Bermuda.”