West of England

Company Description:

The West of England is a leading mutual marine insurer providing its worldwide membership of shipowners, charterers and operators with liability insurance and related services. It also safeguards and promotes its Members’ interests in many other areas of their business.

Formed originally as a British mutual, the Club has insured shipowners for over 150 years and was one of the first to insure international tonnage.

Our business is to take care of marine liability risks for shipowners, charterers and operators. We believe that protection for our Members is as important as the indemnity insurance we provide. To provide both we need to be responsive to our Members’ needs and proactive in looking after their interests and enabling them to more easily achieve their business goals.

We believe we need to have a sound understanding of Members’ businesses and commercial objectives and to be able to create long term relationships where service is a key component.

Financial strength is fundamental to the Club’s long term future but balanced to ensure that adequate reserves are maintained at a level which is appropriate in a mutual context. Size is important to a mutual in order to maintain a broad spread of risk but growth for its own sake at the expense of quality of membership is not part of the Club’s long term thinking.