Willis North America Launches Claim Closure Service

Willis North America, a unit of Willis Group Holdings, a global risk advisor and insurance broker, announced the rebranding of its Strategic Outcomes Practice to Risk Control and Claim Advocacy Practice, effective immediately.

The rebrand is part of Willis’ realignment of this practice to deliver seamless technical claim and risk control consulting services, and better support industry specialization via additional dedicated resources.

Willis helps organizations reduce their overall cost of risk through pre-loss consulting, proprietary data analytic technology and effective claim resolution.

The Risk Control and Claim Advocacy Practice consists of 300 highly experienced claim consultants, risk control and analytics professionals across the North America platform, including professionals where claims can be exceedingly complex such as property, environmental pollution and construction accidents. The practice also features the insurance industry’s only centralized Claims Advocacy and Administration Group (CAAG), a dedicated team of claim professionals who report, monitor and expedite property, specialty and litigated claims.

Willis has boosted its resources in this practice with additional industry expertise to respond to clients’ needs in construction, health care, technology, real estate, retail, manufacturing and hospitality, via the following:

Claim Closure Service: Willis has partnered with Alan Gray, Inc. to launch its claim closure solution to help organizations decrease the number of open claims and reduce the total claims incurred. This effective application frees up valuable resources and improves balance sheets by lowering reserves, decreasing outstanding liabilities and reducing collateral requirements.

Medical Cost Containment Review Services: Willis is expanding its medical cost containment consulting capabilities to address the rising burden of medical costs. It is estimated that by 2020, workers’ compensation medical costs in the U.S. will comprise up to 70 percent of workers’ comp costs.

Human Factors Engineering: Willis’ certified ergonomists apply their understanding of interactions among employees and other elements in the work environment to optimize system performance and reduce the likelihood of musculoskeletal disorders which can result in costly workers compensation claims and decreased productivity.

Supply Chain Risk Assessment and Catastrophe Risk Engineering: Willis has greatly enhanced its capabilities in this emerging area of risk management by combining site-specific catastrophe risk engineering with probability-based hazard risk modeling in order to meet our multi-national clients’ needs for supply chain risk solutions on a global scale. “It’s imperative that we create a center of engineering excellence to address not only the current challenges faced in the property market, but also to address the future catastrophic loss scenarios resulting from global climate change and the increased frequency of severity,” said Marc Hindman, Chief Risk Control Officer and Regional Practice Leader, Risk Control and Claim Advocacy Practice.

Commenting on the rebrand, Joe Picone, chief claims officer, Willis North America, said, “Willis is committed to being a strategic partner to help firms meet their risk management objectives, protect assets and ensure business continuity. As clients’ needs become more global in scope, we are excited to build on our success and drive innovative solutions and resources that deliver true value for clients.”

Source: Willis North America