Underwriter jobs: skills, pay and how to get hired

What an underwriter does

An underwriter, a Risikoprüfer in some German ads, decides for an insurer whether to cover a risk: a factory against fire, a company against liability or cyber attacks, a fleet of vehicles, a ship, or a person's life or health. The underwriter reads the information a broker or client sends, judges the exposure, sets or checks the price and the conditions, and stays within the authority the insurer gives. Over the year the underwriter answers for a book of policies and whether it makes money after claims.

Some titles look alike and are other work. Mortgage and loan underwriters decide on borrowers for a lender; they are covered on the credit analyst page. Insurance agents and brokers sell policies and are not covered here. The actuary builds the rates, reserves and capital models the underwriter works with, and the risk manager looks at the risks of the whole company. The steps from underwriting assistant to chief underwriting officer are in the career paths of this role.

Insurance supervisors differ from country to country, and the section of each country below names them. This page describes the work of underwriters; it is not financial, legal or career advice.

The skills the ads ask for

We read a sample of the ads every day and count the skills they name. On a computer, hover a skill in the text to see its share; on a phone, the table has the same figures.

The craft is underwritingDecide which risks an insurer takes, at what price and on which terms, within your authority. in one or more lines, most often property and casualtyKnow the property, liability, motor or specialty lines you write and how their losses arise., with exposure and accumulation controlSee how one policy adds to the insurer's exposures, limits and accumulations. and pricingUse the rating tools and adjust a price for the features of one risk, and explain the change. inside the actuaries' rates. Industrial and specialty teams add reinsuranceKnow how reinsurance protects the book, and write risks that fit the insurer's treaties. and catastrophe modellingRead catastrophe model results for storms, floods or earthquakes and use them in a decision.; many ads ask for data analysisRead loss, claims and portfolio data to see which risks pay and which do not., statisticsTell a real change in loss experience from chance in a small book. and some knowledge of actuarial modelsRead the actuaries' rates and loss models well enough to use and question them. and the EU's Solvency IIKnow how the EU's Solvency II capital rules make some risks more costly for the insurer to hold. rules, and ExcelBuild exposure and pricing sheets for a risk that a referral reviewer can follow. is everywhere.

The tools are named side by side and none is a must everywhere: policy systems such as Guidewire and Duck Creek, catastrophe models such as RMS and Touchstone, and Excel for exposure sheets. The insurance qualificationsInsurance qualifications show the ground covered; a book that stayed profitable shows the rest. are named the same way, each with its place: the US CPCU, the UK Chartered Insurance Institute's diplomas, the German Versicherungsfachwirt and the titles of the Insurance Institute of India. Much of the job is negotiating with brokersAgree terms, price and conditions with brokers without giving away the insurer's position. and explaining a decisionExplain to a broker in two sentences why a risk was declined or priced up., with claims, actuaries and risk engineersWork with brokers, actuaries, claims and risk engineers who each see the risk differently. at the table, in GermanAsked for in most German underwriting ads, for German policies, brokers and clients. where the clients speak it and in EnglishThe language of the London and international markets, wordings and many reinsurance treaties..

Where the jobs are, country by country

Each country below has its own figures: which cities have the most jobs in our list, whether the number is going up or down, how often ads offer remote or hybrid work, the titles used in the country, and pay ranges from published research, in the local currency.

The supervisors and capital rules are named side by side, each with its place. In the EU, Solvency II sets how much capital an insurer holds for the risks it writes, and BaFin applies it to German insurers. In the US the states regulate insurers and work together through the NAIC; the UK PRA supervises UK insurers and the Lloyd's market in the UK has rules of its own; FINMA supervises Swiss insurers, and IRDAI regulates insurers in India. An insurer's underwriting guidelines turn these into what each underwriter may write.

One risk, step by step

1. Receive: the broker's submission with the client, the cover asked for and the loss history.
2. Assess: the exposure, the quality of the risk, past claims and any surveys or catastrophe model results.
3. Price: the rate from the rating tools, adjusted for this risk, with deductibles and limits.
4. Decide: quote, refer above your authority, or decline, and agree the wording.
5. Follow: claims on the policy, the renewal, and how the book performs over the year.

The hard part is the risk that looks profitable this year and is not: a client with a clean record in a sector where one large loss can wipe out years of premium.

Your CV for an underwriter job

An underwriter's CV is first searched by software for the ad's words, then read by an underwriting manager who wants the lines you write, the size of risks you handle, your authority and how your book performed. Give both: the keywords and the evidence.

Use the keywords the ads use

• Write the work as the ads do: "underwriting", "risk assessment", "pricing", "property", "liability", "broker", "portfolio". The skills table above shows which keywords the ads use most.
• Name the lines and the clients: commercial property, liability, motor fleet, cyber, marine, life.
• Show the results: the loss ratio of your book, renewals kept, new business written within appetite.
• An insurance qualification still under way goes on the CV as in progress, with the modules passed.

Prove each skill

An underwriting line proves itself with the line of business, the decision and how the book did.

Leave out what the insurer keeps confidential: no client names, no premiums, no internal rates.

How we read our data

• The jobs: the underwriter jobs in our job search (underwriters, insurance underwriters, underwriting managers and the German title Risikoprüfer), matched by their titles the way the search matches them; mortgage, loan and credit underwriters are counted on the credit analyst's page. Our list is not the whole market, so we give shares and rankings, never counts.
• The skills: every day we read a sample of these ads and count the skills in them with a fixed word list. Only the counts are kept, never the text of an ad.
• Pay: from published salary research, each source named with its date, as a range from entry level to senior. Our ads are not used for it.
• Dates: every figure is worked out again each day and shows the day it was worked out.

More on the underwriter role