For most underwriting teams, seven to eight weeks. Underwriters need about 18 hours of learning, a short period testing the agent's risk summaries against the underlying submission, two weeks of supervised live decisions, and an exam and sign-off. The decisions are fewer and weightier than in a claims or support queue, so feedback builds more slowly.
Why underwriting takes a little longer
An underwriting agent reads a broker submission, the proposal form, loss history, inspection reports and external data, and drafts a risk summary, a referral note or a suggested price within the insurer's rating guidelines. A good draft is fast and well organised. It can also hide a material fact in a footnote the agent did not weigh.
Underwriters review perhaps a handful of submissions a day, not dozens. Two weeks of supervised work may produce too few decisions to show a pattern, so many teams add a short period of re-underwriting agent-built files by hand before the live queue. Fast-cycle roles like collections follow a shorter curve; compare how long it takes to train collections agents.
How the weeks split
| Weeks | Stage | Underwriting focus |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Foundations, about 4 hours | Depth, the decision chain, why binding stays with people |
| 1 to 5 | Operator learning, about 14 hours | Human review, teaching the agent, keeping knowledge current |
| 4 to 5 | File testing | Re-underwriting four or five agent-built files and comparing |
| 5 to 7 | Supervised live review | Real decisions on held submissions and referrals |
| 7 or 8 | Exam and sign-off | Written exam and sign-off |
What the agent prepares and what the underwriter decides
- Depth 1: reading submissions, proposal forms, loss runs and inspection reports.
- Depth 2: drafting the risk summary, referral notes and a suggested premium within guidelines.
- Depth 3, rarely: quoting simple, small risks that sit fully inside rating guidelines, where earned.
Stays with the underwriter:
- Binding cover.
- Any risk outside guidelines, or needing a referral to a senior underwriter.
- Judgements on material facts and disclosure.
- Declining a risk, and any special terms or exclusions.
Risk assessment and pricing for life and health insurance are listed as high-risk under Annex III of the EU AI Act. Underwriters in those lines need to explain their decisions in their own words and know what the record shows about the agent's role.
Provenance is the core reading skill. The proposal form is declared. A surveyor's report is signed by its author. The insurer's own claims history for an existing client is sealed. A summary that relies on the declared form for a decisive point, when a signed report contradicts it, should be held.
An illustrative example
Take a commercial property underwriting team of six. Foundations in week one; Operator learning at about three and a half hours a week. In weeks four and five, each underwriter re-underwrites five files the agent built.
Two underwriters find the agent summarised a warehouse's sprinkler system as "fully compliant" from the broker's covering note, while the attached survey said the system had not been tested for two years. The agent had cited both sources but led with the declared one. That becomes a change to the agent's brief and a calibration case, as in calibration sessions for underwriters. Supervised live review follows, and the exam comes in week eight.
Brokers sometimes push for quick terms or include instructions in submissions. See training underwriters to spot prompt injection and pressure.
Keeping the underwriter's sign-off meaningful
- Keep new business at depth 2 until underwriters are signed off.
- Re-underwrite a sample of agent-built files every quarter.
- Know when the agent's certificate lapses; a run that clears no depth drops it to depth 1 the same day, and simple quotes return to the queue.
IT administrators face fewer, more technical decisions on a different timeline; see the IT administrator timeline. The full programme is in training teams for AI agents.
Where the Academy fits
Underwriters who review the agent's work every day fit the Operator track of Pryme Intelligence Academy. Module tests are set in the learner's own industry and role. Certified Pryme Operator requires 32 of 40 on a 60-minute exam and a two-week practicum of real review decisions, signed off by a Pryme assessor; the file-testing period above is the insurer's own addition.
Questions people ask
Does the agent change an underwriter's authority?
No. Underwriting authority stays as it was. The agent changes how the file is prepared, not who may bind and up to what.
Should brokers know an agent reviews submissions?
Tell brokers that AI supports processing and that a named underwriter decides. Clarity avoids disputes later about who made a decision.
How do junior underwriters build judgement if the agent drafts everything?
Keep them re-underwriting a share of files by hand. A junior who never builds a file cannot check one.