Insurer, reinsurer, MGA or consultancy: who owns the risk?
The company label tells you less than the flow of premium, claims and decision authority. Start with who issues the policy and bears the insured loss.
Five business models
- Direct insurer: prices policies and holds claims liabilities. Pricing, reserving, finance and capital teams work on different views of the same portfolio.
- Reinsurer: accepts defined layers or shares of another insurer’s risk. Treaty wording, cedant data quality and accumulation across cedants matter alongside expected losses.
- MGA: may have delegated underwriting authority from a carrier. It can design products and manage distribution without automatically carrying the insurance liability itself. Ask who sets rates and who signs off changes.
- Broker: arranges coverage for clients. Analytical roles can focus on placement, catastrophe exposure, benchmarking or programme design rather than statutory insurer reserves.
- Consultancy: produces advice for a client: a reserve review, pension valuation, pricing model or transaction assessment. The engagement defines the deliverable and the decision maker.
What to ask about a vacancy
“Who uses this analysis, and what decision does it change?” is more informative than asking whether the role involves modelling. A pricing analyst at a carrier might maintain a production rating plan; a consulting analyst might build a model and hand over documentation. Neither description alone establishes the proportion of routine work.
These are operating-model distinctions, not a claim about any named employer’s internal teams. Licensing, delegated authority and risk ownership must be checked for the specific legal entity.
Reading sources
ActNet editorial guide · October 1, 2026 · Original illustrative examples.