Art Form

Philomena Comerford, current vice president of the Toronto Insurance Conference (TIC), has seen some major changes in the risk landscape over her 40 years as a broker.

“There are new risks emerging,” says Comerford, president and chief executive officer of Baird MacGregor Insurance Brokers LP and its affiliate, Hargraft Schofield LP. “When I first started my career, nobody talked about privacy or cyber liability. They talked about protecting a customer against (liability) for libel, slander, defamation and those sorts of things, but not privacy breaches.”

Today, Comerford says, “you can’t open up the paper without reading about some sort of cyber or privacy beach.”

Another emerging risk is the rise in weather-related losses, suggests Comerford, who is scheduled to replace Brooke Hunter next March as president of TIC, a networking and advocacy organization for commercial brokers that currently has 21 full members and three associate members, with about 2,000 licensed brokers.

“In the early days, everyone was worried about fire,” Comerford says. “Was a building properly sprinklered? Was it protected? Now, we are worried about water and weather. They were not issues 20 or 30 years ago, but these things are now front of mind and are worrying underwriters and brokers.”

The TIC is well-known for its social events – such as its annual black tie dinner every November and its golf tournament every June – says Comerford, but the conference also does “important work on behalf of commercial brokers and we also communicate with the insurance companies.”

As an example, she points out that TIC liaises with organizations such as Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC), the Registered Insurance Brokers of Ontario, the Insurance Brokers Association of Ontario (IBAO) and the Insurance Brokers Association of Canada (IBAC) on issues affecting commercial brokers.

TIC, which is a member of IBAC, also continues its work to encourage insurance carriers in Canada to include a declaration of emergency endorsement, approved by IBC in 2009, to all commercial property and casualty policies. The aim is to ensure clients have coverage if insurers, brokers or policyholders are unable to conduct normal business as a result of a declared emergency (say, if there is no phone or Internet service).

Noting that the initiative continues to be a priority of TIC, Comerford reports “the intent is to try to get the insurers to globally adopt that endorsement.”

TIC also aims to keep members informed of issues affecting the industry, such as floodplain data, municipal infrastructure and coverage not currently available from Canadian-licensed insurers.

The conference tries to keep track of related products that are not available from Canadian insurers, she says, “so that if an argument needs to be made that this product simply wasn’t available in Canada, then they can seek assistance from (TIC’s) tax committee” to determine if a domestic coverage placement would be exempt from excise tax because of its lack of availability from Canadian-licensed insurers.

In addition to her current role at TIC, Comerford also represents TIC on both IBAC’s Broker Identity Program committee and its telematics committee.

“The subject of automobile insurance has been a political football for decades and I know the use of telematics is something we hope will be a tool to deliver deserved rate reductions to people who actually drive correctly.”

Comerford notes that Baird MacGregor Insurance Brokers has partnered with the IBAO subsidiary, Independent Broker Resources Inc., on a telematics service for the brokerage’s commercial customers. “We think that telematics technology is an important risk management tool because it provides our fleet clients with a sophisticated loss control instrument to help them manage their risks better,” she says.

COMMERCIAL ART

Before becoming a commercial broker, Comerford studied visual arts at The Ontario College of Art and Design University (then known as the Ontario College of Art) in Toronto during the early 1970s.

“From a young age, I was (originally) going to be an artist,” she says. “I decided I would take a little bit of a turn. I was offered a job, one thing led to another and I started working in the claims department” at the brokerage Tomenson Saunders.

That was where her mother, Rose, now 90, worked at the time. “She ultimately followed me (to Baird MacGregor) later and she became our vice president of claims,” Comerford points out, adding that “she retired at the young age of 80.”

Two of Comerford’s co-workers at Tomenson Saunders – Jack Baird and Harry MacGregor – left the brokerage in 1979 to start their own business. They hired Comerford the following year as a senior commercial account executive. She was appointed president of Baird MacGregor Insurance Brokers in 1990.

In 2000, she became a shareholder and with the retirement of its founders in 2007, partnered with then Newport Partners Income Fund – which had purchased the majority of Hargraft Schofield in 2006 – to buy Baird’s and MacGregor’s interests in the brokerage they had founded.

Then in 2009, officials with Newport Partners approached Comerford to “help them take over the management of Hargraft,” she recounts. Two years later, Comerford bought Newport’s share of both Hargraft Schofield and Baird MacGregor Insurance Brokers.

Today, both firms are based in the same location in Toronto. Clients include transportation, hospitality, realty, manufacturing, wholesale and construction companies.

While Comerford’s career in insurance was unfolding, her voluntary work was proving active as well, including serving as the first female chair of the Insurance Institute of Canada in 1994-1995.

In 2009, she decided to join the TIC board. “Because of the fact that Hargraft was a (TIC) member, I felt that it was the right thing to do, and I feel (TIC does) important work,” she says.

ATTRACTING YOUNG PEOPLE

Some of that work includes a scholarship program, launched by TIC last year and administered by the John E. Lowes Foundation. TIC offers as many as three $5,000 scholarships – to relatives of TIC brokers, partners and staff – for students entering second year of a full-time Canadian university undergraduate degree program with a concentration in business, finance or insurance.

“We believe that it is very important to try and entice young people into the industry,” Comerford says. “There are a lot of senior brokers who are reaching retirement age and we want to make sure we have a fresh crop of bright young people coming into the industry so that we can bring them along and have the more senior brokers mentor the younger people coming in.”

Since Comerford was attracted to the insurance business, some things have changed for commercial brokers. “Canada is becoming a more litigious place than it was 10 or 20 years ago, so we are seeing a plethora of bodily injury claims in various classes of business – real estate, hospitality and anything with wheels,” she comments. “Those claims… take a long time to settle,” she adds.

Another change is electronic transactions, especially as Canada Post phases out home delivery.

“I would like to explore how (TIC’s) technology committee could help us develop best practices protocols surrounding banking and customer data security considering the plethora of cyber threats and the movement to increased electronic transmission of data and funds with the phasing out of mail delivery.”

Adds Comerford: “What advice do we give to our clients to protect themselves as they face this impending change? You have to think about what could be our problem tomorrow.”