Insurance Times Awards 2026: Daines Kapp on showing that firms ‘of all sizes’ can embrace AI

Why did you put yourselves forward for the category?

We’ve spent the last two years gradually building artificial intelligence (AI) into the way we work and we wanted an independent view of how this compares with our peers.

Most of what you hear about AI in insurance comes from insurers and the large broking groups, with budgets and technology teams to match.

We’re a family-run broker of 13 people and I felt other smaller independents would find it useful to see a firm our size doing this.

Firms of all sizes can engage with these tools effectively.

What do you think makes your entry stand out and why should you win the award?

We don’t have an IT department or a development budget, but the team now works with a range of AI tools we built in-house and our clients report motor claims through a portal we wrote ourselves.

The tool I’m proudest of helps clients understand their insurance.

We’ve always given them plain-English summaries of policy conditions and exclusions, but it was slow, manual work.

AI now prepares the first draft from the policy wording and a qualified broker checks it before it goes out.

It’s more accurate than the manual version and it frees up time we can spend with clients.

What would winning this award mean to you and your firm?

It would mean a great deal to the team.

We’ve come close at a few awards but to date, haven’t yet got over the line, and a win would recognise the effort everyone here has put in.

More widely, I’d like it to encourage other small brokers.

A lot of firms our size assume they can’t get as much out of AI as the larger firms can and I don’t think that’s true.

If a win helps change that view, even a little, I’d be very pleased.