Data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has appointed Darren Seymour as Head of Operations.

With over 20 years’ experience in service delivery, Darren is a dynamic customer service and contact centre director with a track record of translating strategy into practical customer focused operations that deliver against targets. This includes leading large scale transformation programmes in both the digital and operational elements of the customer journey to deliver significant improvements in the customer experience and engagement. For the past decade he has been has been working within telecoms sector including eight years in the Virgin Group.

In his new role, Darren will focus on ensuring that the Group’s customer service teams continue to deliver the highest levels of customer care. His role will be pivotal in the Group’s digital transformation and he will be working across many areas of the business including IT and the Innovation team to help the Group achieve its ambition to transform insurance and the customer experience.

Hood Group Chief Operating Officer, James Wallis, says: “Darren brings an enormous amount of operational experience to our Group. In particular his experience of delivering multichannel customer service will be invaluable as we work towards evolving and enhancing our customer service offering. Equally important is his considerable knowledge in leading digital transformation programmes as we implement our digital strategy. I’m delighted to welcome someone of Darren’s calibre to the business.”

Commenting on his new role, Darren added: “This is a business with a very clear strategy and one I’m incredibly pleased to have joined. I’m bowled over by the positivity and enthusiasm of each and every one of the customer operations team. Their understanding of their role in helping Hood Group to achieve its ambitions and their commitment to embracing opportunities to take customer service to new heights is going to make my job all the more exciting.”

Data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, today announces that it is joining forces with the University of Essex to develop its data strategy, including artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities.

Hood Group has successfully secured support from the UK’s innovation agency, Innovate UK, to part-fund the 24 month project which represents a further step forward for Hood Group in delivering its data-driven growth strategy.

Through the partnership, Hood Group will be looking to build its capabilities to take advantage of the power of data and innovative technology. As part of the work the Group is undertaking to embed the use of data across its operations, this partnership will help the Group create a highly effective and accurate predictive modelling infrastructure to benefit its brand and underwriting partners and their customers alike.

Hood Group CEO, Simon Hood, comments: “Our goal is to transform insurance and the customer experience. This means shaping personalised customer experiences, products and pricing. Machine learning gives us the infrastructure to do this. It will help us better understand individual risk profiles to deliver fairer pricing and develop products that really meet individual needs.”

He continues: “The whole area of data, AI and machine learning has huge potential for the insurance industry as a whole and will undoubtedly change – for the better – how we can deliver outstanding propositions for our partners. We’re incredibly proud that Innovate UK has recognised our vision to innovate insurance through data. Its support and the partnership with the experts at University of Essex will help give us skills and knowledge that will take our data analysis capabilities to a new level.”

Dr Spyros Samothrakis from the School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering at the University of Essex added: “We are delighted to be involved in this long term partnership, particularly to see how we can apply machine learning principles within the financial services domain to increase the company’s competiveness and further enrich their data strategy”.

Innovate UK is the UK’s innovation agency working with people, companies and partner organisations to find and drive the science and technology innovations that will grow the UK economy. It has committed over £1.8bn to innovation since 2007, helping more than 7,600 organisations with projects estimated to add more than £11.5bn to the UK economy and create 55,000 new jobs.

Data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has expanded its technology team with the appointment of Danny Spraggon as infrastructure and service manager.

An experienced leader with 18 years’ experience managing IT environments and systems, Danny joins Hood Group from London based B2B global advertising company, Gyro, where he served as Head of IT EurAsia.

In his new role, Danny’s remit will cover a wide range of technology initiatives from hosted cloud solutions, to maximising the group’s investment in new technology systems. Managing a team of seven and reporting to Head of IT, Claire Foster, Danny will be working with development and system architecture managers to deliver best in class support, data security and a robust IT platform.

Hood Group CEO, Simon Hood, says: “This is a significant new appointment that further supports our aim and the initiatives that drive that ambition to transform insurance and the customer experience. Technology is the enabler for delivering the transformation – from the use of data and analytics to drive customer value, delivering innovative propositions to our partners, through to working with start-ups. Our investment in technology and optimising it effectively is critical to the success of our business and this is why I’m delighted to welcome someone of Danny’s calibre to our team.”

Hood Group today announces that Covéa Insurance, one of the most trusted and well-respected insurers in the UK, has joined its panel of insurer partners.

Hood Group Commercial Director, Bruce Reid, comments: “We’re committed to evolving our existing products as well as developing new types of insurance cover that will add value to our brand partners and deliver products that truly serve today’s customers. We want to build relationships with forward thinking insurers to help enhance our current brand partner propositions and help us test new concepts and deliver new products, so we’re delighted to be able to work with Covéa Insurance. They not only have a wealth of experience across a wide range of product lines but also enjoy an outstanding reputation for innovation and high levels of customer care.”

Sue Coffey, Director of Intermediated Distribution, Personal Lines at Covéa Insurance adds: “Hood Group has established a reputation for helping their partners deliver innovative insurance solutions and we’re looking forward to working with them. Their ‘Select & Protect’ business has a strong reputation amongst UK mortgage intermediaries, a sector of the market where we see great potential. We’re delighted to join its modular home insurance panel.”

Data and technology-driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has appointed Stefanie Haydock to the newly created role of Innovation Manager based at the group’s recently launched Innovation Lab in Spitalfields.

Hood Group CEO, Simon Hood, says: “The appointment of Stefanie will provide dedicated focus on the Group’s aim to transform insurance through innovation – be that partnering with start-up businesses to support their scale-up plans, implementing innovation ideas within the propositions we provide to our brand and insurer partners or using innovation to improve efficiencies in the way we do business. She understands the challenges and opportunities that are emerging at an ever-increasing pace through technology and disruption of the insurance market and coming from a different part of the world, brings a fresh perspective to the UK market which will really help us deliver on our objectives.”

Stefanie’s personal lines insurance career spans eight years at AA Insurance in Auckland, New Zealand. During this time she held a variety of roles including change and communication, strategy and product development and innovation specialist. In this last role she was responsible for generating and embedding a culture of innovation through the business and driving product and service improvement.

Commenting on her new role, she adds: “It’s an exciting time to be joining the business as I firmly believe that Hood Group is in a unique position to not just talk about change, but actually work within the groundswell of innovation and disruption in the insurance sector whether that is as an accelerator or through delivery of our own initiatives. The Group’s recent investment in new IT platforms delivering feature-rich and agile functionality and the set up of the innovation lab, demonstrated to me it really wants to challenge the way things have been done to develop products and services that truly meet the needs of today’s customers.”

Data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has appointed Mark Izzard to its board as director of its dedicated travel insurance division, Hood Travel.

Mark is a leading figure in the world of travel insurance distribution, having set up and been involved in many travel insurance brands over the last 15 years. In this new role his focus will be on providing guidance, support and direction to the Group’s travel insurance proposition for its insurer and brand partners.

Hood Group CEO, Simon Hood, says: “Mark is well-known and highly regarded in the travel insurance industry. Not only does he have a proven track record of launching and managing travel insurance brands, but he is a recognised expert in digital marketing and ecommerce. I am delighted that we have attracted someone of his calibre and am confident that his expertise will help build upon and improve our already successful travel proposition.”

Commenting on his new role, Mark adds: “I share Hood Group’s view that the use of data and innovation is the key to transforming the customer experience and delivering sustainable solutions. I look forward to bringing my relationships and knowledge to the team and working with them to create travel insurance products and services that will add real value to our partners and their customers.”

The UK government has announced new travel restrictions on selected routes to the UK, which means that large phones, laptops and gadgets are banned from being taken in hand luggage on inbound direct flights from Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia. This comes following a similar ban imposed by the United States.

In response to this and working closely with our gadget cover underwriter Taurus, we are pleased to confirm that we have extended our Travel Insurance cover to include items that are placed in the hold of the aircraft, for all flights affected by this ban. This means that our affinity brand partners’ customers will be protected during their trip home.

Mark Allsopp, Head of Travel Insurance, comments: ‘Hood Group are committed to partnering with insurers who provide the best customer service in the industry and this is a fine example of this. When important restrictions like this are imposed it is crucial that we are able to respond to the needs of our brand partners’ customers quickly. We are delighted that the travel products that we provide enable customers to enjoy their holiday with total peace of mind.’

Data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has entered into a knowledge exchange partnership with the University of Essex, home of the UK Data Archive – the lead organisation of the UK Data Service.

The partnership will see Hood Group working with the University’s world class researchers on an initial project to analyse and review the Group’s existing insurance schemes and propose methods to reduce its question sets through data enrichment and predictive product selection at the point of quote. Further research projects are planned throughout the course of 2017.

Paul Firkins, Business Development Director comments: ‘Collaborating with external partners is a key part of our strategic vision to transform insurance. Whether that’s working with start-ups, data providers or insurers, building long term strategic partnerships is the most effective way to take advantage of all the innovative energy in the InsurTech space.’

He continues: “Utilising the wealth of knowledge at the University and having access to their data scientists will enable us to drastically reduce quote times whilst at the same time, guiding the customer to the right product for their needs. In our view, this vastly improved customer experience will deliver significant benefits to the overall insurance proposition that we deliver for our brand partners.”

This initial project marks the start of the knowledge exchange partnership between Hood Group and the University of Essex and further projects involving data and analytics are planned throughout the year including reviewing peer to peer insurance and smart connected homes.

Professor Maria Fasli from the University of Essex adds: “We bring together academic experts in analytics and data science from across our University to offer cutting-edge research, specialist courses and vital insights for business. We’re excited to work with Hood Group as it looks to innovate and transform the insurance customer’s experience.”

Hood Group has begun testing a new connected home pilot programme designed to evaluate escape of water sensor technology and inform the development of new home insurance propositions.

Working in partnership with smart home provider, Lightwave, Hood Group will be running the pilot over the next two months.

Hood Group Head of Marketing and Innovation, Gavin Dobson, explains: “The insurance industry needs to find better ways of insuring people’s homes and delivering a better experience for the customer. We believe the Internet of Things can have a hugely positive impact in the household market and as water damage is a huge area of claims for home insurers, we felt where better to start than piloting water flow sensing technology. We want to use this test programme to prove its effectiveness, understand the costs involved and ensure resulting actions to reduce escape of water risk won’t negatively impact the customer’s lifestyle. At the end of the day, any new proposition has to be practical and affordable for the customer or it’s a non-starter as far as they’re concerned.”

The test is being conducted in three different domestic properties running various household scenarios and simulating escape of water to determine the different uses of the technology, prove that sensors will report reliably and that systems can be shut down reliably and practically without interfering with the homeowners’ lifestyles.

Dobson continues: “We’re committed to being at the forefront of using the latest technologies to develop new types of insurance cover that will add value to both our partners and their customers. Combining our own tech expertise with other third parties such as Lightwave can provide forward thinking insurers with the ability to effectively test new concepts. We’re really excited to get this pilot off the ground and look forward to taking the findings forward to help deliver insurance products that truly serve today’s customers.”

The winner of the first hackathons run in-house by data and technology driven insurance specialist, Hood Group, has been announced.

The hackathons were held on 8-9 February and 15-16 February with two teams each tasked to come up with a solution to a particular challenge. Team Travel focused on developing a new travel insurance proposition that can be sold via messenger bots such as Facebook Messenger while Team Residential turned their attention towards building a ‘no questions asked’ home insurance solution.

After lengthy discussion the judging panel –Charlotte Golding from AXA, and Hood Group’s own Financial Director, Mark Hunter and CEO, Simon Hood – named Team Travel as the winners.

Simon Hood comments: “I was really impressed at the amount of work both teams managed to do in a short space of time and the quality of the ideas they came up with however there could only be one winner. The prototype presented by Team Travel and the speed with which they could actually produce it and launch it to the market put them one step ahead of Team Residential.”

The February hackathons were just the starting point and more sessions will be scheduled through the remainder of the year.

Hood concludes: “These hackathons represent a great opportunity for everyone in our group to voice their ideas. Input from all areas across our business will be invaluable to produce exciting new products and help us move further down the line to transforming insurance.”