Lockton Brokers SA

“We prefer that our clients don’t insure” – the value proposition at the heart of Lockton Insurance South Africa.

A rather counter-intuitive idea for a B2B insurance business which is part of the world’s largest, privately held, independent insurance brokerage, with over 7000 professionals serving 52,000 clients worldwide.

“We encourage our clients to take more risks themselves and to put more skin in the game,” says Lockton SA CEO, Seamus Casserly, whose 30+ years in corporate financial services and insurance provide the founding expertise for Lockton SA.

“Ultimately this achieves two things: it focuses management’s mind onto the actual risks in the business and how best to mitigate against them, and it ensures that our clients know exactly what they are, and are not, covered for.”

This unique, slow-cooked approach to insurance prioritises advisory fees over commissions, thus foregoing the allure of quick profitability in a rising market, in favour of a less volatile business model, built on trust and a cost-appropriate approach to risk.

“When I say we are advisory, I say that deliberately. We don’t have insurance products that we generate substantial revenue on,” says Casserly, “this is because we prefer to be judged by the quality of advice that we give our clients, rather than to have our clients question whether we are giving them advice to generate revenue for ourselves”.

“We have had significant success in persuading our clients to take more risk themselves, rather than relying on the insurance markets to do so. That is what we do, and what we prefer to do, because it’s best advice, rather than convenient advice.”

“We are not advocating insurance, we advocate knowing your risk. Make conscious decisions about what you will do with your risk. And if your balance sheet cannot tolerate it, then insure it. But if your balance sheet can tolerate it, then take it on the chin”

– Lockton CEO, Seamus Casserly

In essence, insurance should only make sense, when it makes sense.

As an insurance broker who advises ,when possible, against insurance one might naturally wonder as to the nature of Lockton’s relationship with Fulcrum Premium Finance and Fulcrum Collections.“We use Fulcrum Collections when we run monthly debit orders for our clients, which simplifies collections,” says Casserly, “the second leg we use them for is for Forex payments.”

“We have three issues with regard to collections: accuracy, timeliness and ease of access, and Fulcrum handles these issues perfectly. Fulcrum Collections has ticked all those boxes.”

“We have been overly impressed with the accuracy and quality of their work. We provide the policy record; they process those records very well and they are 100% accurate.”

“Fulcrum’s performance has been superb. There has only been real, positive feedback about their performance.”

Outsourcing to Fulcrum enables Lockton to focus on its core competencies, so that we can “make sure we do it better than anybody else can in-house.”

When it comes to premium financing, Lockton has built a relationship with Fulcrum Premium Finance that spans over a decade.

“This is a long-standing relationship and a number of my clients have been doing premium finance with them for many years,” says Colleen Cresswell, Senior Corporate Broker at Lockton SA.

“I have not had one complaint, they have all been extremely complimentary in terms of the service and I believe that the relationships our clients have maintained with Fulcrum over the years are indicative of this quality.”

And what it is that makes Fulcrum stand out above its competitors?

“Ultimately it comes down to the trust factor – our clients know that Fulcrum is trustworthy, purely based on the experience,” says Cresswell.

“It’s a symbiotic relationship that delivers benefits to all parties – Fulcrum, the insurance provider and ourselves.”