Five minutes with...Commercial Express

Founded in 1999 in Dudley, Birmingham, Commercial Express provide the highest quality service and use their unrivalled industry knowledge to compliment their range of insurance schemes.

They specialise in Property Owners, Liability, SME, Caravan & Trailer and Catering & Events insurance schemes.

Grab a cuppa and read on to see how they have been living the Chartered Ethos.

How long has your firm been Chartered?

Less than 12 months.

Why is Chartered status important to your business?

Corporate Chartered status is a recognisable institution, an independently assessed barometer of our technical ability, customer service, and professionalism.

To hold the status is a direct reflection of our business, the direction we wish to travel, and the third parties we wish to be associated with.

What initiative has the organisation been involved in which has had a social impact/corporate social responsibility focus on?

We have invested in ESG and have an ESG/CSR committee internally who are always looking to promote our social impact.

We have introduced volunteer days, matched funding, corporate charity sponsorships, and regular fundraising events to the organisation. And we have committed to a five-year sponsorship of our main charity partner, The Birmingham Adult Transplant Sport Team, who are a team of people who have undergone organ, stem cell, or bone marrow transplants. Using our marketing channels, we promote the team and support their participation in events like the British Transplant Games.

In addition to this, we actively fundraise for the associated charity, University Hospitals Birmingham.

Our office is based in Dudley, so choosing a local charity for our fundraising efforts was an obvious and meaningful partnership decision. And it allows us to raise awareness of the importance of having conversations with families and friends about organ donation.

We are always committed to promoting equality of opportunity, with fair and transparent policies and procedures we’re really proud of our workforce gender balance with 50% of the Senior Leadership Team and 53% of the overall Management Team who are female.

How do you ensure your employees remain at the forefront of their profession?

This is an area of huge importance to Commercial Express which, as an organisation, we feel very strongly about. We have a professional development programme for all employees which includes structured monthly one-to-one meetings, mid and end-of-year appraisals, and a bi-annual personal development plan to understand any training needs or career aspirations they may have.

We encourage colleagues, many of whom are Underwriters, to take part in our incentive scheme to study for their Cert CII, Dip CII, or ACII in the form of either an interest-free loan with a pay rise on completion or company-funded entirely; it is their choice. We also pay for all internal CII memberships.

We employ a technical trainer to undertake in-house training for our Underwriting Service Department on technical content and licence training levels 1-5.

And we have an online learning platform with content such as technical and regulatory modules, Insurance products, leadership and management, health and safety, communication skills, and compliance, for all our colleagues and brokers to use, with excellent CPD reporting functionality.

We allow and actively encourage all colleagues to dedicate at least two or three hours per fortnight to learning and development.

How have you implemented the CII Code of Ethics into your business?

We feel that we have always aligned ourselves quite closely with the CII Code of Ethics, but now a little more so.

We’ve ensured that our D&I policy has been fully embedded whilst at the same time reconsidering our mission statement and values to align with the code. Our existing values are very much based on our culture being:

-warm and friendly

- our communication being effective to ensure transparency

- our support building long-term and trusting relationships,

- encouraging innovation

- investing in performance through professional development

- and being personal and professional in our approach.

What advice would you give a firm who is considering applying to become Chartered?

There are massive tangible benefits in terms of attracting new insurance partners. The advantages of holding Corporate Chartered status opens many more doors and provides us with greater opportunities than previously and also includes attracting new talent to the business.

We’d especially like to say that the support from the CII has been incredible, and they are an excellent partner to work with.

If you would like to learn more about Corporate Chartered status, visit our dedicated page.