Insurance broker could axe 1000s of jobs

Insurance broker could axe 1000s of jobs

21 February 2005 14:14

Insurance broker Marsh & McLennan may cut hundreds of jobs in the UK this spring, it emerged yesterday.

The US-owned company - which employs more than 1000 at its offices in Norwich - is reported to be considering repeating a cost-cutting exercise that saw 280 jobs lost in the UK last November as part of a 3000-strong global cull. The job cuts could come as soon as the end of March, when the company completes a review of its business.

No one from Marsh & McLennan was available to comment yesterday.

But a Sunday paper quoted Bruce Carnegie-Brown, the recently promoted chief executive of Marsh's Euro-pean and Middle Eastern operations, as saying the company was not ruling out anything. When asked if job cuts similar to those last November would be needed to put the group back on track, Mr Carnegie-Brown said: "That could be one of the outcomes."

Marsh and McLennan is a global professional-services firm with annual revenues topping $11bn (£5.8bn). It deals in risk and insurance services through its Marsh, Guy Carpenter, MMC Capital and Kroll arms. Kroll was recently appointed as the administrators of collapsed department store Allders.

Marsh & McLennan also has investment-management group Putnam Investments and business consulting group Mercer.

Marsh has some 6450 employees at more than 30 offices in the UK, including Norwich. Last year, it emerged that Marsh was expected to move 150 jobs to Norwich from London when its Docklands office closes this summer. But that was tempered by news that 150 jobs in Norwich looked likely to switch to India as it joined Norwich Union in offshoring work overseas.

Many observers have been speculating for weeks that Marsh will make drastic changes to its operation in order to recover profits after its reputation was tarnished last year by a kickbacks scandal in the US following a probe by New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer.

He accused Marsh of rigging bids and using inflated quotes to steer clients to insurers that paid the best commissions. A Debt Settlement with Spitzer's office is likely to run to up to $750m (£396m).

Mr Carnegie-Brown was credited with exonerating the broker's UK operation of any bid rigging after hiring law firm Freshfields to do a review.