20 Nov 2006
PRESS RELEASE
London, Monday 20th November 2006
ARISTA APPOINTS ARAG FOR LEGAL EXPENSES
Arista Insurance, the new commercial lines insurer launched earlier in the year by Charles
Earle, has signed an agreement with ARAG Group to provide Arista with a legal expenses
insurance product.
The cover that will be provided to all Arista package policyholders, and will be optionally
available on commercial combined policies, has a number of key extensions not readily
available elsewhere in the market. All policyholders will also have access to a legal helpline as
well as the ARAG legal services website.
Arista CEO Charles Earle said: “ARAG is recognised one of the world’s leaders in legal
insurance and the company mirrors much of what Arista is trying to achieve in terms of their
focus on a high customer service and an adaptable approach to their business partners. We are
delighted to be working with them.”
Sales Manager at ARAG, Andy Talbot, said: “We were given a tough brief by Arista – to provide
groundbreaking commercial legal insurance and associated legal services in an economic and
simplified way. Being new to market ourselves, our flexibility in terms of underwriting and
service was key. Our business model is based around the utilisation of quality solicitors, which
Arista recognised would provide a higher level of service than ordinarily found. We look forward
to working with the Arista team, with whom we share similar values and beliefs”.
Arista was formed by Earle and former NIG colleague Lyn Carslake, who together have secured
the support of Lloyd’s Underwriters Canopius and Equity Insurance Group both as investors and
as long term insurers of the core commercial property, liability and motor classes of business.
The venture remains subject to the usual regulatory approval process.
Arista will focus on broker administered commercial business in the UK and intends to arrange
agencies with a limited panel of independent brokers in 2006 and 2007. In the medium to long
term the new venture will have the capacity to write in excess of £250 million worth of business.
Ends
Notes to Editors:
Arista Insurance Limited
Arista is an SME insurance provider specialising in property, liability and motor classes of
business. Arista offers brokers a genuine chance to work with an insurance provider that will
design its processes around theirs in an effort to reduce their frictional costs. For those brokers
who work with Arista, the company delivers an improved bottom line and a responsive market
staffed by people with experience, technical knowledge and a willingness to see the broker as a
customer.
ARAG Group
As a legal insurance specialist, ARAG has acquired valuable experience in 70 years of doing
business in its home market. The Group is deploying this know-how in international growth
markets with enormous success: today, ARAG is actively assisting customers in eleven
European nations and the US. The international subsidiaries contribute 47 percent of premium
revenues in ARAG’s core business. ARAG has attained a leadership position in the US legal
insurance market, and its legal insurance products make it the undisputed market leaders in
Spain and Italy.
Services relating to the law comprise the historical and strategic core of this Dusseldorf-based
family enterprise. ARAG employs in excess of 3,700 persons, and generates a premium income
of over €1.3 billion.
For more information on the Group visit www.arag.com