April 13, 2026

Using Renewal Leverage to Help Support Program Resilience

A favorable renewal window is here. Consider using it to strengthen coverage, not just chase rate.

Insurance programs often run on autopilot: Last year’s policies get dusted off, exposures like building values, payroll, and revenue are updated, the renewal comes in, and fingers are crossed in hope that no claims will slip past the insurance “shield” over the next year.

That routine may have been sufficient in a hard market. It’s less effective today. We’re in a stretch where buyers have more leverage than they’ve had in some time, but the opportunity is easy to miss if you’re only focused on pricing improvement. A recommended approach is to use today’s conditions to help enhance risk management program resilience and potentially reduce costly surprises later.

What the market is telling us

Marsh’s Global Insurance Market Index shows global commercial insurance rates declined 4% in Q4 2025, marking the sixth straight quarter of declines.

It’s also useful to note what’s happening beneath that global rate drop:

Property rates fell 9% globally in Q4 2025.
Cyber rates fell 7% globally.
Casualty moved in the opposite direction, rising 4% globally, driven by the US where casualty increased 9% (12% excluding workers’ comp).
In the US overall, rates were flat in Q4 2025, with property down 8% while casualty continued to climb.

When some lines of coverage are easing and others remain tight, your renewal outcome depends less on luck and more on program design, policy terms, and which lines you choose to re-market or expand.

Use property relief to improve recovery, not just pricing

With property pricing softening, many organizations are seeing real premium relief for the first time in years. The temptation is to take the win and move on. But property is also where policy terms have quietly tightened over multiple hard-market cycles—often without a corresponding review of how those changes affect recovery after a loss.

This is a good moment to revisit how your program would actually respond to a loss, especially where cash flow is concerned.

Business interruption assumptions, extra expense coverage, catastrophe deductibles, sub-limits, and coverage triggers all influence how quickly an organization can stabilize after an event. If your business interruption assumptions are outdated, your waiting periods may no longer reflect operational reality. Or if key sub-limits were trimmed during prior renewals, premium savings alone may not offset the financial drag of a delayed recovery.

Easing property conditions can give buyers leverage to negotiate improvements in these areas. That might mean revisiting indemnity periods, rebalancing deductibles for catastrophe exposures, or restoring sub-limits that directly support continuity. The goal should be to improve predictability.

Benchmark the lines where one event can define the year

Property losses are visible and familiar. What often creates more uncertainty are the “severity lines”—coverages where a single event can meaningfully impact earnings, balance sheets, or leadership focus for an entire year.

Umbrella and excess liability, cyber business interruption, and directors and officers (D&O) coverage all fall into this category. These programs tend to evolve slowly, even as exposures change quickly. Limits that were reasonable five years ago may not reflect today’s revenue, footprint, or litigation environment. Attachment points and structures that once felt conservative may now leave gaps between what you retain and what you expect insurance to absorb.

A favorable market window is a chance to benchmark these lines against current market norms and peer programs. That doesn’t mean buying more limit by default. It means validating whether your structure still aligns with the size, complexity, and risk profile of the organization — and whether coverage language would perform the way stakeholders expect under stress.

Pressure-test liability drivers before they pressure you

While property and cyber conditions are improving, casualty remains challenging, particularly in the US. Social inflation, third-party litigation funding, and expanding theories of liability continue to push severity higher. That makes it even more important to understand where your program is most exposed to volatility.

Pressure-testing liability drivers starts with questions like: Where are we most likely to see a large claim? How effective is our contractual risk transfer? Are retentions aligned with actual loss frequency and severity, or just historical comfort levels?

Claims trends, attachment points, and policy wording all influence how much risk you’re truly retaining. Even if casualty pricing itself doesn’t soften, insights gained from this analysis can inform smarter use of leverage elsewhere in the program — including how property savings are redeployed.

Turn renewal leverage into meaningful improvements

Many of the most effective renewals this year may not be those with the largest net premium decrease. They tend to be the ones where organizations intentionally build a short list of strategic improvements and decide which are worth funding with available leverage.

That starts with benchmarking and validation. Comparing your current limits and key terms for umbrella/excess, cyber, and D&O coverage against today’s market can reveal whether you’re underinsured, overpaying for inefficient structure, or carrying exclusions that no longer reflect your risk profile.

From there, focus on closing high-impact gaps. Trade credit coverage, for example, can help stabilize cash flow when accounts receivable risk is material. Environmental liability may warrant a fresh look if operations, real estate holdings, or regulatory expectations have changed. These aren’t always headline coverages, but they can meaningfully reduce earnings volatility when exposures exist.

Alignment with risk appetite is the final filter. Insurance tends to work best when designed intentionally. Adjusting retentions, towers, and wording should reflect what the organization can realistically absorb versus what it wants to transfer.

Where property leverage can go the farthest

For many organizations, property relief can help fund improvements across the broader program without increasing total spend. Common areas to consider include:

Enhancing business interruption, catastrophe coverage, or critical sub-limits that directly support recovery
Improving cyber liability limits and coverage terms, particularly around business interruption and contingent exposures
Adjusting umbrella and excess limits and reviewing attachment strategies to better reflect loss severity risk
Adding or expanding trade credit coverage where receivables concentration is meaningful
Evaluating environmental coverage to ensure fit with current operations and assets
Investing in safety and loss control measures to mitigate risks of loss

None of these decisions exist in isolation. Each affects how risk shows up on financial statements, how leadership experiences a loss, and how quickly the business can move forward afterward.

A chance to be deliberate

Insurance cycles don’t stay favorable forever. When pricing softens, terms loosen, and capacity returns, buyers have a window to be deliberate instead of reactive. That window is open now.

Organizations that use it well may spend less time being surprised by insurance and more time confident that their program is doing what it’s intended to do: absorbing volatility, supporting cash flow, and giving the business room to operate when something goes wrong.