Advanced Diploma in Insurance

Demonstrating professionalism in insurance practice.

The Advanced Diploma is the professional qualification for insurance staff with aspirations of reaching a senior position within the industry. The Advanced Diploma provides an enhanced understanding of insurance practice, both in terms of technical subject matter and overall management skills. Holders can apply to become an Associate of the CII and to use the designation ‘ACII®’.

The Advanced Diploma is a comprehensive assessment of market knowledge and understanding. In becoming Advanced Diploma qualified you join the community of proven insurance professionals. It is evidence of your purpose, commitment and ability. It can be your passport to a successful and fulfilling career.

The Advanced Diploma in Insurance is appropriate for:

• today’s insurance managers and technical specialists.
• staff with aspirations to become managers in the future;
• those employees who wish to demonstrate their professional standing.
• insurance employees without another professional qualification and those who wish to build upon existing general academic qualifications, such as a degree, by obtaining an industry-specific qualification.

Flexible and comprehensive

As an Advanced Diploma candidate, you can select units from across the entire CII qualifications framework, which means you have access to all 4the units currently available.

They offer something for everyone, whatever sector of the insurance industry you work in and whatever your particular specialisation or preferred career path. These range from the fundamentals of insurance practice and legislation through to personal lines product families, classes of commercial insurance and specialisms such as aviation, marine and the North American market.

The qualifications is modular in structure, which allows you to select units of study according to your preference and career requirements.

Each unit has a credit value and the accumulation of the stipulated number of credits leads to the award of the Advanced Diploma. Successful completion allows you to apply to use the designation ‘ACII®’ (CII membership and Continuing Professional Development requirements apply).

From the Advanced Diploma you can apply for Chartered status (subject to having five years’ experience, not necessarily postqualification), with the CII’s three Chartered titles reflecting your career specialism:

• Chartered Insurer;
• Chartered Insurance Practitioner; and
• Chartered Insurance Broker.

Chartered status cements your professional standing and gives you parity with other professionals such as accountants and solicitors.

Meeting market expectations

Importantly, this qualification has been designed to assist you and your employer to comply with both the existing and future regulatory training and competence requirements. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) requires you to demonstrate that you are competent in the work you do, and thereafter to maintain this competence. This approach is designed to ensure that you have the appropriate knowledge and skills to perform your job effectively. Qualifications can play an important role in helping to meet the requirements by serving as an objective measurement of your technical awareness and understanding.

Insurance qualifications framework

For details on the full range of qualifications within the framework please see the Overview section.

Why the Advanced Diploma in Insurance?

This qualification can help your career in the following ways:

• Demonstrate to your employer, peers and customers your commitment to personal learning and development.
• Can form part of an overall programme to meet the regulator’s training and competence requirements.
• Supports lifelong learning as prior study is recognised as you progress through the qualifications framework, taking accumulated credits with you.
• Supports personalised learning programmes as you select the topics most appropriate to your role, rather than follow a rigid pre-set learning programme.
• A ‘Record of Achievement’ is awarded for each unit passed, providing portable and permanent evidence of learning undertaken.
• Advanced Diploma in Insurance awarded upon completion.
• Upon completion of this qualification you can apply to use the designation ‘ACII’. This is respected throughout the industry and increasingly acknowledged by the public as demonstrating professional standing (CII membership and Continuing Professional Development requirements apply).
• Advanced Diploma holders can apply to become Chartered title-holders.

Your next step

Now that you have read about the Advanced Diploma in Insurance, gained an understanding of what it offers and decided it meets your career development plans, it is time to finalise your entry.

This Advanced Diploma in Insurance section contains all the information you require to study for and complete this qualification. As you read through this, you will learn about the units on offer, the available learning materials, course and exam entry dates and deadlines, terms and conditions relating to entry, and the different ways you can enter.

Please take the time to read this, as it will help you choose the study programme that best fits your needs.

Prizes

Each year the CII may award a number of prizes for exceptional performance in its qualifications. These prizes cover a variety of situations, such as completing a qualification, the best performance in a single unit or certain groups of units, and exemplary performance by those working in certain sectors of the industry. The prizes are sponsored by a wide range of organisations within the insurance and financial services industry.

Should you not wish your contact details to be given to the sponsor of a prize for which your exam performance may make you eligible, you should indicate this by ticking the appropriate box in the ‘Declarations’ section of the application form.

Advanced Diploma in Insurance prizes

• The Crawford Prize (home candidates) £375 - [this prize is only open to UK candidates]
• The Crawford Prize (overseas candidates) £375 - [this prize is only open to candidates at overseas centres]
• The Henry J Tapscott Prize £250
• The John Ellams Award £200
• The BIBA Prize £200 - [only open to candidates who are employees of members of the British Insurance Brokers Association]
• The International Underwriting Association (IUA) Marine Prize £250 - [only open to candidates who are working in marine insurance, and who have passed both marine units 770 & 775]
• The Swiss Re Reinsurance Prize £250 [this prize is only open to candidates who have passed both reinsurance units 785 & 825]
• The Manchester Centenary Prize £100
• The Aviation Insurance Association Prize £100 - [only open to UK candidates employed in aviation insurance who have passed unit 780]
• Management unitsP17 and 940: - The Insurance Institute of Ireland Centenary Prize £100 - [awarded to the candidate who achieved the best results in one sitting]
• Core units (units 510, P05, 530 or P04): The Barnfield Prize £150
• The J B Welson Prize £150
• Best results in units 785, 825 and 925: The Paul Golmick Reinsurance Prize £300 - [awarded to the candidate who achieved the best results in units 785, 825 and 925]

Single unit prizes:

• 530 Business and economics - The Worshipful Company of Insurers - John Greig Prize £100
• 655 Risk management – The Chubb Insurance Company of Europe Prize £300 [Winning candidate must be employed within the UK by an insurance broker or a reinsurer. The winner also has the opportunity to spend a 10 day work experience placement with Chubb Loss Control Services]
• 655 Risk management -AIRMIC Prize £100
• 735 Life assurance - H J Greening Prize £100
• 745 Principles of property insurances – London Business Interruption Association Prize £150 (Best candidate at the April 2006 session)
• 745 Principles of property insurances – London Business Interruption Association Prize £150 (Best candidate at the October 2006 session)
• 750 Commercial property insurance underwriting – The Chubb Insurance Company of Europe Prize £300 [Winning candidate must be employed within the UK by an insurance broker or a reinsurer. The winner also has the opportunity to spend a 10 day work experience placement with Chubb Loss Control Services.]
• 755 Liability insurance – Stanley Brown Prize £100
• 770 Principles of marine insurance – Bristol Marine Insurance Association Prize £150 [only open to UK candidates]
• 775 Marine insurance underwriting – McNeill and Wallace Award, Liverpool Underwriters Association £200 [only open to UK candidates employed in marine insurance and/or marine reinsurance]
• 785 Principles of reinsurance – Boleslaw Monic Prize £100
• 790 Private medical insurance – Healthcare Award: Advanced Level £100
• 820 Claims management (non-life) – Kenneth Griffiths Prize £375
• 825 The application of reinsurance – J Lepine Memorial Prize £100
• 930 Insurance broking – Burton Rowe Prize £80 [only open to UK candidates]
• 945 Marketing – Worshipful Company of Marketors Prize £100 [only open to UK candidates]
<-- >