About Us
As an insurance solutions provider, Austin Stone caters for a range of niche markets with an emphasis on professional services, trusts, aviation, industrial and commercial operations.
The company was founded in 2009 by industry experts Neil Austin and Glenn Stone who pooled their collective experience and merged their own independent businesses – Austin Beresford and Glenn Stone Insurance.
Austin Stone is underpinned by a strong service ethic, a solid understanding of our clients’ business sectors and great experience in creating innovative and tailored insurance solutions.
Austin Stone Limited is a member of the Insurance Brokers Association of New Zealand (IBANZ) and the Allied Insurance Group Limited.
We consider ourselves as strategic business partners and are genuinely interested in helping our clients achieve commercial success. A critical success factor is, of course, the appropriate management of identified business risks.
Our approach is to identify and quantify the risks, evaluate existing products, create tailored solutions and explore relevant non-insurance measures to help you find the best possible overall solution. In practice this may comprise a mix of specialised insurance products supported by practical measures designed to minimise your costs while maximising your coverage.
Here’s what we bring to the table:
| Customised cover | From ‘tweaked off-the-shelf’ policies to purpose scripted cover; we offer what best meets your needs. |
| Exclusive policies | We have developed exclusive policy wordings (e.g. in professional negligence) that are not available elsewhere. |
| Local Insurers | We are connected with most major local insurers. From Ace to Zurich Insurance – our offering is comprehensive and very competitive. |
| Overseas insurers | Unlike many other local brokers, we have access to most major offshore underwriters including Lloyd’s of London – our offering is comprehensive and very competitive. |
| Ease of doing business | We develop a service plan that aligns our service with your internal processes and systems. For annual premiums we offer monthly payment plans with extremely competitive finance rates. |
| Proactive & approachable | You will hear from us at agreed intervals, not just when your insurance is due. |
| Accessible advice | We have a wealth of information and are happy to advise you in risk/insurance matters; whether you want to assess your contractor’s insurance cover or review contract indemnity clauses. Expert advice is only a phone call away. |
| Global reach | While we are predominantly active within Australasia, our global network ensures that we are well placed to look after your international interests. |
| Claims management | We have a dedicated claims team and an excellent track record in managing claims. We pride ourselves in producing outstanding results in a timely manner. |
| Risk consultation | We engage leading independent consultants in areas such as Health & Safety programmes; ACC audits; review of “Insurance & Indemnity” clauses in contracts; site surveys; risk profiling; hazard identification and risk assessment; emergency response/contingency planning/crisis management; product recall planning. |
Insurer Relationships & Financial Security
We restrict our relationships to insurers and/or underwriting agencies that offer a claims paying ability rating of “A-“ or higher. We will only place business with lower rated agencies if instructed to do so by our clients.
Some of the insurers and underwriting agencies we currently have relationships with are:
| - Ace Insurance - Allianz Insurance - American Home Insurance Company (Chartis) - Associated Marine Insurers Agents - Classic Clover Insurance - Comprehensive Travel Insurance - International Underwriting Agencies - Lloyds of London Insurance Underwriting Syndicates |
- Lumley Insurance - Mariners Underwriters - M & G Underwriting Agency - New India Assurance Company - NZI Insurance - Star Underwriting Agents - Vero Insurance - QBE Insurance - Zurich Insurance |
We have access to tailored agreements and insurance covers via the Allied Insurance Group Limited with some exclusive arrangements and pricing.
Assessment of Financial Security
We rely on the security ratings provided by recognised specialist security rating agencies Standard and Poors, Fitch Ratings and A.M. Best.
