Case Study: Large-scale regulatory initiative support within the Insurance Industry

Generali Switzerland insures more than one million customers and offers products for every situation in life. These include property insurance, legal protection insurance, life insurance and pension solutions. Generali partners with start-ups to develop innovative products. The company is the first Swiss insurer to launch a fully digital pillar 3a. Generali Switzerland is part of the Generali Group, one of the world’s leading insurers, headquartered in Trieste, Italy. Generali has two head offices in Switzerland – one in Adliswil and one in Nyon – and operates a wide network of agencies throughout the country.

Challenge:

Generali Switzerland was faced with implementing a revision to the Federal Act on Insurance Contracts (ICA) within its Swiss insurance business. An encompassing and far-reaching legislation which involved the legal and compliance assessment and change of Generali’s insurance contract frameworks against a mandated deadline. The scope of the work included the review and change of over 500+ contracts.

The in-house legal team and its project managers possessed the know-how and internal process knowledge to design the necessary steps to execute the initiative. However, as the regulation ran parallel to the legal team’s daily business work, they did not have the capacity to execute both workstreams simultaneously. Instead, Generali sought the support of a specialized legal services provider who could deliver customized legal support within Swiss insurance law and the ability to mold their offering to the company project plan.

Interim Legal’s specialized and customized approach:

Engaging with the project management and legal team, Interim Legal qualified the necessary legal expertise in the Swiss jurisdiction with a focus on insurance law and practical experience in contractual review across several languages (German, Italian, French and English).

Interim Legal was able to provide a qualified team of consultants to Generali within 7 days of the inquiry, allowing Generali sufficient time to interview and assess each consultant against the tasks within the project. Once the project was underway, Interim Legal actively worked with the multi-disciplinary team to structure the engagement with its proposed team in unison with the initiative, supporting Generali in the ramp-up of the project, during its implementation and its conclusion.

Outcome:

• The ICA revision was completed ahead of schedule
• By using Interim Legal, Generali was able to save comparatively on outside counsel spend by managing the project internally
• Using a flexible legal services provider such as Interim Legal enabled the legal team to gain support in a specific area of legal work whilst retaining ownership of the design and execution of the project

The ability of Interim Legal to access specialized legal talent tailored to our specific needs is unique within the Swiss market.

André Büttner Senior Legal Counsel, Generali