Underwriting interview prep.

Behavioural questions to expect

1. Walk me through your CV.
2. Tell me about a difficult risk or analytical decision you've made.
3. Tell me about a weakness, a failure, or feedback you've received and worked on.
4. Why underwriting — and why insurance?
5. Which line of business would you want to underwrite, and why?
6. Why the firm?
7. How would you describe the firm's book and underwriting approach in your own words?
8. How does an insurance carrier actually make money — underwriting vs investment income?

Technical concepts to master

• The underwriting decision

  Risk selection · Accept / decline / refer · Terms + conditions · Underwriting authority + referral

• Pricing + rate adequacy

  Loss cost · The premium build · Rate adequacy · Technical vs market price

• Underwriting profitability + ratios

  Combined ratio · Loss ratio + LAE · Frequency x severity · Reserves + IBNR

• Reinsurance + the underwriting cycle

  Treaty vs facultative reinsurance · Retention + attachment · Accumulation + catastrophe · The underwriting cycle (hard / soft)

Practical drills

• A book earns $200m premium, incurs $130m losses + $10m LAE, and $52m underwriting expenses. (a) Loss ratio, expense ratio, combined ratio? (b) Is it an underwriting profit? (c) Roughly what rate increase would bring the combined ratio to 98%, holding losses and expense dollars flat?
• A submission comes in for a risk in the carrier's line. Walk me through how you'd assess it and what you'd recommend. Be ready to be probed on the perils, the price, and the terms.
• Your rating plan says the technically adequate premium for a risk is $120k (loss cost $80k + expenses + profit load). The broker says the market will only pay $95k, and you have a premium-growth target. Do you write it, and on what terms?

Smart-question anchors

• Appetite + lines - what the carrier writes, where it's growing vs remediating, and the target combined ratio
• Authority + process - underwriting authority levels, the referral structure, and how submissions flow
• Pricing + tools - rating plans, predictive analytics, and how rate adequacy is monitored
• Portfolio + reinsurance - accumulation / catastrophe management and the reinsurance programme
• The cycle + appetite - where the carrier sees the market and how appetite is changing

Sourced from

InterviewPrep — Insurance Underwriter Interview Questions · CFA Institute / analystprep — Analyzing Insurance Companies · PwC — Commercial insurance performance measurement · OpsDog — Combined Ratio benchmark (P&C) · Society of Actuaries — underwriting cycle (hard / soft markets)