Richard Brookes Actuary Taylor Fry

Richard is an actuary with Taylor Fry Consulting Actuaries. He has been a consulting actuary since 1992 and has a PhD in mathematics. He has led many projects using data mining and other statistical modelling in the insurance, banking and government sectors. He is married with one year old twins and asks you to be kind in your questions since he is likely to be somewhat sleep deprived.

Tony Coleman   Chief Risk Officer and Group Actuary   IAG

Tony Coleman is the Chief Risk Officer and Group Actuary of Insurance Australia Group (IAG), the largest general insurer in Australia and New Zealand. IAG operates through well known insurance brands which include NRMA Insurance, RACV Insurance, CGU, SGIO, SGIC and Swann Insurance in Australia, State Insurance and NZI in New Zealand and Safety Insurance in Thailand.

Reporting to the CEO, his responsibilities include all aspects of risk management at IAG including insurance product pricing policy, valuation of claim liabilities, asset & liability management, capital adequacy assessment & allocation, R&D, operational risk monitoring, fraud & security risk control and the internal audit & compliance functions for all of IAG’s businesses which currently earn total revenues in excess of A$6.5 billion p.a. Tony is also a member of the board of the Trustee of the IAG and NRMA Staff Superannuation Fund.

Prior to joining IAG in December 2000 he was a senior corporate finance partner of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). His 15 year career as a partner at PwC covered both internal management roles building businesses and a diverse range of business valuation and corporate finance advisory work for clients in a wide range of industries. Tony also has extensive financial services industry experience having worked earlier in his career in both a bank and a major life insurance company.

Throughout his career, Tony has played an active role in the actuarial profession. He was President of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia in 2001 and was subsequently Chairman of the Institute's HIH Royal Commission Taskforce. Internationally, he is vice-chairperson of the Financial Risks Committee of the International Actuarial Association (IAA) and is a member of the IAA Insurer Solvency Subcommittee.
In 2004 Tony received the prestigious “Actuary of the Year” award of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia.

He is also the Australian representative on the International Accounting Standards Board Insurance Working Group which was formed to assist the IASB to develop a new International Insurance Accounting Standard.

In recent years, Tony has also been an active participant in promoting a better understanding of global warming and climate change in government and the community by collaborating with eminent scientists, business leaders and organizations including WWF and the Australian Conservation Foundation. He is also a member of the United Nations Environmental Program Climate Change Working Group.

He is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia and holds BA and MBA degrees from Macquarie University in Sydney (where he was also won the Allen Knott memorial award for best overall performance in his year for the MBA degree).

Elaine Collins Partner Trowbridge Deloitte

• Elaine Collins is a Partner of Deloitte, specialising in general insurance actuarial work for the Trowbridge Deloitte service line.
• She has worked in the general insurance industry for over 15 years and has acted as an Approved Actuary continually since the APRA regime started in 2001.
• Elaine is currently involved in a number of M&A assignments, and also provides assistance to Deloitte auditors by undertaking reviews of actuarial insurance liability valuations, for both large and small audit clients.
• She was involved in the drafting of two Institute Professional Standards:  Financial Condition Reports for General Insurers (PS305) and External Peer Reviews (PS100), both of which were released earlier this year by the Institute in final form.
• Elaine leads the Sub-committee re-drafting PS300 in accordance with the new Institute requirements using “must” instead of “should”, among other changes.
  

Jefferson Gibbs   Director   KPMG Actuaries

Jefferson is an Actuary and a Director at KPMG Actuaries. He has 15 years experience in NZ, the UK and Australia as a consulting actuary.  He is the Approved Actuary to one insurer and also holds a number of formal and informal External Peer Review roles.

Jefferson has a broad range of experience including extensive reserving exercises, peer reviews and audit assists, mergers and acquisitions and strategic work.  This involved work with personal lines and commercial insurers, Lloyd’s and London Market reinsurers and non-insurance entities with substantial self-insurance including local governments, global corporations and a nuclear electricity company.

Jefferson is a member of the General Insurance Practice Committee.

Andrew Houltram Senior Actuary Ernst & Young ABC

Samantha Hu Manager KPMG Actuaries

Samantha is an Actuary and a Manager at KPMG Actuaries with 4 years of consulting general insurance experience. She is substantially involved in providing actuarial support to a number of small and large audits of Australian and Singaporean insurers and government bodies. This is in addition to her more regular consulting work including acting as a Valuation Actuary assisting Approved Actuaries and assisting clients with strategic work.

She is on the editorial committee of the General Insurance Practice Committee Newsletter and has assisted in submissions on regulatory and legislative reform.

Chris Latham Partner PriceWaterhouseCoopers

Chris Latham has worked as a consulting actuary in general insurance for over 25 years, and  has been a part of the  dramatic increase in the influence of actuaries in the industry during that time.  His clients have included Australia's major insurers and reinsurers, as well as regulators, governments and accident compensation schemes. His advice has covered all actuarial aspects of writing general insurance business.

He is currently the lead actuary to a number of accident compensation schemes, each of which he advises on reserving, premium rates, funding issues and the effect of legislative change. He was heavily involved in the costing of the effects of tort law reform in a number of jurisdictions.

He is an active member of the actuarial profession. He was a member of the early groups which prepared the professional standard relating to outstanding claims. He was convenor of the Institute of Actuaries Taskforce on Financial Condition Reports in General Insurance, and has also been involved in discussions on external peer review as a member of the Institute's Professional Standards Committee. He has been involved in recent reviews of the actuarial Code of Professional Conduct.

He has been a partner with PricewaterhouseCoopers for the past 17 years, where he is the Senior Actuary. 

Karl Marshall Chief Actuary, General Insurance Promina Group

Karl Marshall was admitted as a Fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries in 1997 and a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia in 2001, having earlier completed an Honours Degree in Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Edinburgh.  Karl’s career started in the UK in pensions and continued on arrival in Australia with a stint in superannuation with William M Mercer.  In 1999, Trowbridge gave Karl the opportunity to move over from the dark side and commence a career in general insurance.  In 2001, Karl moved to Promina (then Royal and Sun Alliance) where he has remained to this day.  As Chief Actuary, Karl is responsible for the implementation of Insurance Liability valuations across all of Promina’s general insurance operations, giving him direct exposure to a wide range of portfolios.  Karl also advises management on technical and strategic aspects relating to Promina’s reinsurance arrangements.  Finally, Karl is also the Approved Actuary of RAC Insurance in WA, a partially owned subsidiary of Promina.

Conor O'Dowd Partner PricewaterhouseCoopers

Conor is a partner in PricewaterhouseCoopers Actuarial based in Sydney.  He is a qualified actuary with 20 years’ experience, advising on issues relating to risk modelling and the development of reporting tools for assessment of capital adequacy and risk adjusted performance measurement in the financial services industry.  Over the past 10 years he has provided advice on credit risk, economic modelling and insurance risk modelling to both major and regional Australian banks and insurance companies.

Mitchell Prevett   Actuarial Consultant   PricewaterhouseCoopers

Mitchell Prevett is an Actuary and a subject matter expert in statistical modeling and data mining across a variety of Actuarial and other applications.

Mitchell is currently a manager at PricewaterhouseCoopers Actuarial, where he has been working for the past 5 years. Most notably, he has developed Statistical Case Estimation models in Workers' Compensation and Motor Bodily Injury insurance for large accident compensation schemes and insurance companies.

Mitchell continues to pursue statistical rigor in financial modeling and enjoys uncovering insights with clients

Lisa Simpson Partner PriceWaterhouseCoopers

Lisa Simpson is a Partner the general insurance actuarial practice, with more than ten years’ experience in both life and general  insurance and accident  compensation valuations and pricing, advising on impacts of Scheme changes, capital modeling and audit support. Lisa’s key clients include WorkCover Queensland, the Territory Insurance Office, United Medical Protection and Insurance Australia Group.

Lisa is a member of the Institute's General Insurance Practice Committee, responsible for financial reporting

Andrew Smith Director PriceWaterhouseCoopers

Andrew is a director at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Sydney.  He is a qualified actuary with 14 years’ experience in general insurance, advising on issues relating to pricing, reserving, reinsurance, portfolio monitoring, risk margin assessment and dust disease modelling.

Andrew joined PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2001 and spent 18 months in the London office working primarily on London market and Lloyd’s of London assignments before returning to the Sydney office.  Prior to joining PricewaterhouseCoopers, Andrew was employed in the Australian corporate market.

Greg Taylor   Director   Taylor Fry

Greg Taylor is a founding Director of Taylor Fry Consulting Actuaries.  He also holds honorary professorial positions in the actuarial centres of the University of Melbourne and the University of New South Wales.