A new underwriter joining a team with an underwriting agent should not approve a held quote until their onboarding checklist is complete: authority confirmed, red lines on sources and declines signed, shadowing on referrals, reviewer training and exam, a practicum on real submissions, a drill, and sign-off that keeps approval rights inside their written authority.
What will the new reviewer face?
The underwriting agent reads broker submissions, extracts the risk details, pulls loss history and third-party data, checks the risk against appetite and drafts a summary and price. Where the insurer allows it, the agent quotes standard risks within narrow bounds at depth 3. It refers everything else: risks outside appetite, prior claims above a threshold, unusual occupancies, sums insured above its limit, and every decline.
The skill a new reviewer most often lacks is judging the source of each fact. A broker's submission is external until it is confirmed; a loss history from the insurer's own claims system is sealed. A summary that blends both reads as one confident account. The reviewer must know which figures in it they can lean on. Where the business prices life or health insurance for individuals, the EU AI Act treats that risk assessment and pricing as high-risk, which raises the expectations on human oversight. And underwriters work to written authority; agent work does not widen it.
How do you use the checklist?
The underwriting manager owns it and fills in the reviewer's authority before the first day. Work through each line in order; approval rights over agent referrals begin at line 14. For what onboarding means more generally, and how underwriting fits in the business's training order, see the guide to training teams for AI agents. The teaching method is in how to train the underwriting team to review AI agent decisions.
The checklist
| Line | Item | Confirmed by |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Read-only access to submissions, referrals and the record | Manager |
| 2 | Written underwriting authority recorded: lines, limits, referral rules | Manager |
| 3 | Agent capabilities read: extraction (1), data gathering (1), appetite check (1), summary and price drafts (2), standard quotes within bounds (3), referrals and declines (held) | Reviewer |
| 4 | Red lines signed: never bind or quote on a broker's figure that the summary presents as verified without checking its source; never approve a decline without reading the policy wording and the referral reasons; never approve outside written authority | Reviewer and manager |
| 5 | Conflicts declared: brokers or insureds the reviewer has a connection to | Reviewer |
| 6 | Shadowing: two days on referrals with a certified underwriter | Buddy |
| 7 | Seen a referral where the agent's summary mixed sealed and external figures | Buddy |
| 8 | Shared foundation complete | Learning lead |
| 9 | Reviewer modules and written exam complete | Learning lead |
| 10 | Practicum: two weeks of real referrals, confirmed by a buddy | Buddy |
| 11 | Coverage: an out-of-appetite risk, a decline, a submission with understated losses, a price near the reviewer's authority limit | Manager |
| 12 | Incident drill completed | Manager |
| 13 | Assessor sign-off; no missed red line | Assessor |
| 14 | Approval rights over agent referrals set inside written authority; renewal date set | Manager |
Worked example
An illustrative specialist insurer's fleet motor team brings in Sample Underwriter PP. Her written authority runs to fleets of 50 vehicles. The agent quotes fleets of up to 10 vehicles with clean histories and refers the rest.
During shadowing, a referral arrives for a 30-vehicle courier fleet. The agent's summary reports "two minor claims in three years", taken from the broker's submission. The buddy asks for the signed claims experience letter from the previous insurer, which shows a third claim: a large injury claim the broker had left out. The price is reworked.
Sample Underwriter PP's practicum covers 55 referrals. She declines a risk only after reading the policy wording that excluded the vehicle class, writes the reasons herself, and refers a 60-vehicle fleet upward as outside her authority. Her drill follows how to run an AI agent incident drill for the underwriting team. She is signed off in week 7 with referral approval up to her 50-vehicle authority.
Where the Academy fits
Pryme Intelligence Academy covers lines 8, 9 and 13. Operator certification needs a 40-question written exam, passed at 32 of 40, and a two-week practicum with at least 95 in every 100 decisions correct and no missed red line, signed off by a Pryme assessor. A business can make referral approval rights depend on a current certificate as well as written authority.
Questions people ask
Who sets up the data connections the agent uses?
IT, with underwriting input. IT reviewers have their own path, in the reviewer onboarding checklist for the IT team.
Should compliance sample underwriting referrals?
Yes, especially declines and pricing for individuals. Compliance reviewers are prepared through the reviewer onboarding checklist for the compliance team.
Does an experienced underwriter need the full checklist?
The agent parts, yes. Experience in underwriting does not teach how this agent sources and blends facts. An experienced underwriter may move through shadowing faster.