Charlotte’s original plan was to qualify as a lawyer, but a chance encounter while on work experience led her to develop her investigative skills helping businesses recover when catastrophe strikes – more detective than defence.
Having studied English literature at Manchester University, Charlotte was unsure what to do next and was considering a career as a lawyer until she met a specialist loss adjuster. “I was doing some work experience in a City law firm when I was introduced to a loss adjuster. Frankly I had no idea what he did” said Charlotte “but he was involved in looking at the effects of the first Ukraine war on businesses and he travelled a lot – all of which sounded very interesting so I went to spend the summer there and found that I really loved the role.”
Once something goes wrong – for example goods get confiscated in a war, then the loss adjuster steps in like a detective to work out what has happened and how much it will cost to put right.
After four years, Charlotte moved into claims handling – working for Canopius, an insurance company. “Being the claims professional means you are responsible for ensuring the insurance policy pays out as it should, and in figuring out how to make things right when they have gone wrong. You are the link between the underwriter who sells the policy and the broker representing the client”.
Charlotte sees her role as seeing everyone’s point of view so she can get the best result of all parties. “I love fixing things and trying to solve a thorny problem. I work with political risks, so that can be everything from a government taking property or goods illegally, riots or terrorism. These cases are very personal to our clients and our job is to be there for them.
“This is a specialist area of insurance so you really get under the skin of the problems, you read the news – Ukraine, Israel etc, and you have clients who are in the middle of it. You also get to know the other experts in the market and we are a tight community”.
So, what makes handling claims so interesting? Charlotte’s view is “this is where the detail and the depth is. Underwriters are selling the product, we are delivering the promise. There is loads to get your teeth into and it’s great when you help a business get back on its feet”.