CBN CEO Richard Crawford on challenges facing authorised representatives

Community Broker Network (CBN), one of Australia’s largest general insurance authorised broker networks, empowers authorised representatives to provide the best insurance outcomes for their clients. In an Insurance Business Australia (IB) TV (IBTV) episode, CBN CEO Richard Crawford shared the trends and challenges facing authorised representatives operating under CBN’s broker license.

CBN’s 300 authorised representative businesses and collectively 900 million, which deliver general insurance services to the Australian market, have faced various challenges in the past years, including the COVID-19 pandemic and regulatory changes.

Crawford explained that CBN’s authorised representatives use one license. All members of the community are focused on doing the right things for their clients within the regulations, he emphasised, making compliance a secondary issue.

“The challenge for us is to make sure that there are no acts or omissions on their part which could put the license at risk or, in fact, create a negative outcome for the customer,” he said, highlighting that broker networks must ensure that their authorised representatives have the tools and resources to do their job well.

Crawford also noted the difficulty of the current market due to extreme weather events that led to a mountain of claims and activity.

“Insurers are getting more selective about the risks they want. So, broking business is certainly taking a lot of effort and initiative these days and then couple that with the shared workplace issues as a result of COVID,” he said. “It’s a busy environment to be in and also to be learning about new changes coming and keeping up with it.”

Find out more about the challenges facing authorised representatives in Australia and how broker networks can help them, by watching the IBTV episode “CBN CEO lifts lid on largest GI authorized broker network” here.