Articles by Chris Burand

Burand is the founder and owner of Burand & Associates LLC based in Pueblo, Colo. Phone: 719-485-3868. E-mail: chris@burand-associates.com.

E&O Claim Frequency Is Increasing

Through my recent discussions with clients and carriers, it is clear to me that agencies are incurring substantially more errors and omissions (E&O) claims. A significant difference exists between the number of claims agency E&O carriers are seeing and the …

Underwriting vs. Coverage Standards

Historically, if an account met an insurance company’s underwriting standards, the account was provided coverage in exchange for the required premium. Sometimes insureds and/or agents lied about the account actually meeting those standards, which would only be discovered after a …

How To Correctly Design Insurance Coverage AND Make More Sales

Years ago, Chris Boggs authored a phenomenal white paper titled “How to Read an Insurance Policy.” Everyone selling insurance, adjusting claims, and underwriting should read it, especially people new to the industry. It is a must read. I share this …

Are Commercial Property Insurance Companies Dinosaurs?

The vast majority of commercial property, i.e., assets, are no longer physical. The majority of commercial assets are intangible. In fact, the overwhelming majority of assets owned by insurance agencies are intangible. They consist of those things called “expirations.” Other …

A Better Method for Measuring Distributor Value

Carrier management teams are under intense pressure to cut expenses, but to make smart cuts, the right measures must be taken first. This is especially true when the cuts affect the distributors that generate all the carrier’s sales. For most …

Surplus Lines Risk Factors

A generation has passed since the last hard market and a substantial proportion of the people employed in agencies today have never experienced one. This means they have never dealt with surplus lines in such large volumes as we see …

A Great Opportunity

A great opportunity exists for those who want to make a difference in their communities, clients’ lives, and businesses on a professional level. Insurance was created to protect people’s and businesses’ assets, i.e., to protect their balance sheets. When a …

Why Boutique Agencies & Brokers Win

Professional boutique agencies are the solution, the only real solution, for all those producers who compete against big shops, insurtechs that use bots rather than humans, and those with low price/low quality commodity price distributors. My light bulb moment, when …

Another Day, Another Insurance Regulator Failure

As I am writing this article, AM Best reported another property/casualty insolvency this morning. If I am not mistaken, more P/C insolvencies and P/C carriers have become nonfunctioning over the past 12 months than in the last five years combined. …

The Unprepared Face Many Surprises When Selling Their Agencies

What is being sold when an owner decides to sell their agency? Expirations (generically). What are expirations? Data. Why is data valuable? Because the data enables one to create a revenue stream. The revenue stream is what is actually being …