Supervisor Interview Flashcards
Tell Me About Yourself
I have been with CIC for over 6 years and am currently a senior claims specialist. started in property insurance 15 years ago straight out of college and have worked for two other major carriers. I have been on the elite cat team for 4 years and have been on 15 different storms. I think that my acquired skills and knowledge would make me a great fit for this position.
Where Do You See Yourself In Five Years?
I see myself gaining additional knowledge and leadership skills and eventually moving up within HQ claims.
How Do You Imagine A Typical Day
I imagine my day starting with completing my daily diary tasks. I envision this would be making sure each file is continually moving forward and adjusting reserves as necessary. I would then respond to any emails or voicemails that I receive during the morning. I would review any new files that I am assigned and set the proper reserves.
What Is Your Typical Day
My typical day begins with reviewing my task files. I will make phone calls and update the files as needed. I will respond to emails and update those files accordingly. If I have a new claim, I will make contact and set an inspection. If I have an inspection, I will meet with the insured and any contractors. I will take notes and then give the insured a timeline or process for where the claim file will go from here.
How do you manage your claim load?
I proactively set up tasks to follow up with my claim files. I try to set 30 day status updates on Mondays. For the rest of the week, my tasks consist of action items. For example, call insured to follow up on contractor estimate. Ideally, any active claim file should be touched twice a month. I try to put the ball into the insured’s hands instead of them waiting for me to respond or provide them with information.
Are You Comfortable Traveling?
Yes. On the Elite Cat team, I have become very comfortable traveling. I have worked in group settings while on storm duty and have also worked solo on several occasions. I am comfortable with either situation.
How would you deliver bad news?
As a claims adjuster, sometimes delivering bad news is part of the job. What I try to do is be honest and forthright with the customer as soon as I see a potential issue. I advise them that there may be a coverage issue but I won’t be able to make that decision yet. I feel it is a lot easier to eventually break the bad news if the insured is not blindsided. I like to read over the policy language with the insured and I will always send a denial to the agency so they are aware of the situation.
What are your weaknesses?
Public speaking has always been a weakness of mine. In the future I would like to take some online classes to help me get comfortable speaking in front of crowds. I would also like to take some classes or read some books to help me better utilize all the functions in Outlook.
What are your greatest strengths?
I think I am very empathetic with customers and can connect to them on a personal basis during their losses. I also pride myself in my property knowledge and estimation abilities. Even the most experienced of my team members come to me when they have questions. I have never turned down a claim no matter the size. I handle change well and help bring other members of the unit on board to any unit changes.
What do you consider the toughest aspect of this job?
I think the toughest aspect would be familiarizing myself with policy language that I am not accustomed to seeing. However, I think this is something that I would quickly catch on as I have in past situations.
What about your current job makes you prepared for this position?
I think my 15 years of adjusting prepare me well for this position. I have taken on larger and more complex files. I have built strong relationships with many different vendors that assist on different aspects of the claim process. Being on the elite cat teams has helped me demonstrate that I work well in high stress and high capacity situations while being unsupervised. The cat experience has also helped expose me to additional coverages that I would not see in my regular adjusting role.
Describe a time with a hostile client who is unhappy with your assessment?
A tornado claim that I handled in Nashville. The insured was not happy with the assessment by myself and the accountant in regard to his BI payment. I was able to work with the insured, the agent, and the accountant to schedule a meeting to discuss the policy coverage and how it applied to this situation. In the end the insured was happy with the outcome.
What is your approach to managing stress?
This job can be stressful. I think it helps to keep a defined schedule and organization within your claim files. It also helps to block out certain times of the day to dedicate to returning phone calls, answering emails, and working claim files. I like to workout to relieve stress and also play with my dog.
Tell me about a large fire that you have handled.
I handled a claim for a vacuum repair company. He owned a 3 unit building in which he was the occupant of one of the units. A fire started in one of the tenants units. I contacted the insured and met with him on site and reviewed the damages. I informed him that we would have a C & O come out to inspect and determine the cause and location. I was able to contact Homelink to search for an alternate working situation for the insured. Unfortunately the insured did not take us up on this offer. I worked with Young and Associates to get an estimate completed on the building. I worked with the insured and national vendor to assess his damaged contents. I also had an accountant from Meaden and Moore contact the insured to review BI. The insured was able to locate a contractor and we were able to come to an agreed cost of repairs.
Tell me about a large commercial tornado loss that you have handled.
In Nashville I had several large tornado losses that exceeded $500,000.00. One was for a manufacturing firm. They constructed parts for automated machinery. I worked with the insured to get an accountant involved. I contacted a building consultant to inspect and estimate the building damages. I contacted an engineer to inspect the building for structural integrity. Luckily the building was sound. We issued an ACV payment relatively quickly. There were some hiccups with the BI coverage as the insured was not interpreting the policy language in the same way that we were. After several discussions with the insured, accountant, and agency, I decided it would be best to set up a conference call to go over the policy language and see if we could get everyone on the same page. We were successful in doing that and settled the BI portion of the claim. The insured ended up being able to get the repairs completed for our ACV payment and no further payments were issued on the building.
Tell me about a large residential tornado loss that you have handled.
A claim I am still handling from this incident is for a residential home that was completely destroyed. Luckily nobody was hurt in the home. I worked with the insured to find an alternative living situation immediately through Homelink. I advised her that I would be contacting a building consultant to review the loss and provide us with a rebuild cost. I also got her in touch with a contents specialist to help her create a contents list for items that were in the home. The insured has had some issues getting the home rebuilt. We were seeing little progress at one point and I then placed the file onto a weekly diary to ensure that movement was happening. The insured eventually was able to find a builder and the home is currently under construction with a POR ending in September.
Tell me about a time you went above and beyond for a customer
I had a recent claim with an insured during the Texas freeze. I met him on site and worked with him to locate a mitigation company. After I was wrapping up my inspection, the insured let me know that his business partner was upset that he hasn’t been contacted yet. I advised him that I would look into the situation and see who was handling the file. After speaking with the storm manager, I was told that his business partner’s claim was being handled by an adjuster that hadn’t arrived in town yet. I asked him to reassign the file to me since I already had a relationship with them. I called his business partner on site and set a same day inspection on his home.
When you’re working with a large number of customers, it’s tricky to deliver excellent service to them all. How do you go about prioritizing your customers’ needs?
I think the best way to go about prioritizing client needs is by being organized. The best organization is a clean diary system. I keep a proactive diary system.
