Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Thursday, 4 July 2019
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach
Insurance Sector: Discussion
Mr. Seán McGrath:
In Allianz we would consider our pricing and planning into the future on an annual basis. Pricing would be considered on a quarterly ongoing basis in terms of adjusting. When we set out our plans we must decide where we believe we can best compete and where we have the expertise to compete. The Senator mentioned the haulage business. That is not an area in which we would operate. We do not have the expertise to underwrite that properly and therefore we would not underwrite that area. We would take a view as to whether we can operate in any particular sector sustainably and professionally over the long term because we like to get into a market and stick with it. We do not like to withdraw from markets or cause issues to arise in that way. If we can see a long-term future, and again it comes back to the cost of claims, if the level of claims come down, many of these sectors experiencing problems would find there would be more competition and more capacity for their businesses. It links back to the cost of claims being very high, and for some industry sectors that causes capacity issues.
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