Safe passage, underwritten

Haldersund insures commercial cargo in transit. Three marine underwriters started the firm in Bergen in 2009. Today 1,900 specialists in 18 offices work from the same idea: a crossing is only safe when someone knows the water.

Why a strait

A strait is narrow and tidal. It punishes anyone who reads the chart but not the current. Ships get through because a local pilot knows where the water runs. We named the company after one because that is how we see transit risk.

Most cargo is lost at the narrows: a transshipment nobody watched, a customs hold, a truck leg nobody surveyed, a yard where the seal was cut. We price and cover those points with the attention a pilot gives a channel.

From Bergen to Tacoma

The firm began with three underwriters and one conviction: a policy should be readable by the person who signs it. Rotterdam opened in 2012, close to Europe’s largest port. In 2015 we made Tacoma our US head office, chosen for the Port of Tacoma and the Pacific lanes that run through it.

We now write cover on more than 140 trade lanes and insure about $2.4 billion of cargo value a year. The scale has changed since then. The wording has not.

Network

Eighteen offices, one standard

Underwriters and claims handlers sit in the ports they cover. A loss in Antwerp is inspected by someone who can drive to the quay.

18 Offices

1900 Specialists

96% Claims settled in 30 days

What we work by

How the firm is run

These are the reasons a client renews with us, and the reasons we decline a risk now and then.

Underwrite with discipline

We price the risk in front of us. If the numbers do not work, we say so early, even when we would like to win the account.

Survey in the field

Our surveyors board the vessel and walk the warehouse. A phone call is not an inspection.

Write plainly

A clause should make sense on the first read. If it needs a lawyer to explain it, we rewrite the clause.

Answer at three in the morning

Losses do not keep office hours. Our loss notification line is staffed 24 hours a day, every day of the year.

Settle without delay

Ninety-six percent of claims close inside thirty days. A settled claim is a client who can reorder stock and keep shipping.

We started with a small book of cargo in Bergen and one aim: cover that reads as if it were written by someone who has stood on a quay in January. Everything since has been the work of keeping that true at scale.
Founding partners, Haldersund

Talk to an underwriter about your lanes

Tell us what you ship, where it goes, how it moves, and how much of it a month. We will come back with terms you can read in one sitting.

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