Brokers are experiencing a “mixed bag” following the June 30 renewals, bringing into question whether the market really is going into a hard market.

Sydney-based AIIB Account Manager Paula Henderson says June 30 saw some quite substantial increases in the property market, with rises of up to 15%.

“But liability and other financial lines products are fairly stable,” she told insuranceNEWS.com.au. “Domestic lines are definitely being affected by the floods.”

Paul Murphy, the MD of outer Sydney broker Insurics, says major insurers are definitely pushing price increases, which are “sometimes unreasonably high”, and very little business is being rolled over.

“There is no justification for these increases in areas of long-term low claims which are showing particularly good retentions over five years,” he said.

Major underwriting agency SRS says there is no doubt people in Far North Queensland are “doing it very tough”.

CEO Paul Lynam says although there have been fairly consistent cyclone deductibles available in the region since 1992, a lot of underwriters are now pulling out the market following the Queensland floods and Cyclone Yasi.

He says the whole region is under pressure across all lines.

“There are now very few underwriters up there and few with cyclone deductibles, but brokers need to start talking to specialist underwriting agencies to look at different ways to solve their clients’ problems,” Mr Lynam said.

Cairns broker Joe Vella says he is now questioning the number of irregularities facing the market, especially considering the pre-renewal hard-market warnings for commercial insurance.

He says it has been disappointing to see underwriters “sending out the message loud and clear” that increases are imminent, only for nothing to happen.

“It has been completely contrary to what we’re been led to believe,” he told insuranceNEWS.com.au. “We passed the warnings on to our clients, but in reality the rises haven’t filtered through.”

Mr Vella says there has been no real impact on commercial lines, while personal lines prices are now rising by 30-50%.

And where there are commercial lines rises – usually clients affected by Cyclone Yasi claims – they are up to 200%.

“Particular risks known to be challenging, including some of the traditional risks such as hotels, motels and properties on islands – have extremely restricted placement in the market,” he said. “They’re lucky to even get one underwriter interested.”

Farming is also a very difficult line to cover in Far North Queensland at the moment with traditional insurers such as Wesfarmers’ “refraining from writing any new business until further notice”.