Steve Maxwell has just sold his Smart Insurance Services brokerage to Gallagher, including a unique online platform for Australia’s market stall holders.

How was the move to Gallagher’s East Melbourne office?

It's been great, I feel at home already. Everyone's been friendly, had a smile on their face and been welcoming. Boi Bolinao has been with me for five years and the two of us moved over.

I was seeking a way to transition out of the business after 45 years in the industry. I started discussions many months ago and from the moment I met (local Gallagher CEO) Sarah Lyons, and then the rest of the team, I knew Gallagher had the best understanding and best fit for my business.

From my clients' point of view, they're going to have better access to systems. I've got some people in the transport industry and Gallagher has specialists in that area. I've got some professional indemnity business that needs particular attention, and Gallagher certainly has the right individuals to look after that style of business.

So I've got total comfort my clients will be looked after.

Tell us about your online MyMarketInsurance offer for market stall holders

My business is definitely slightly different to your average insurance broker because I have a large internet portion of my portfolio.

We have market insurance, which services the need for public liability for stallholders all around Australia, a system we developed about 10 years ago. We now have thousands of stallholders purchasing policies online, it's been a success story. Food, arts and crafts – all those sorts of markets. It's an essential part of them doing business and it's a two-minute process online.

On a good day we could sell 50 policies. It's a very easy system that we developed, and in addition we look after the market owner’s liability requirements. So it takes up a large proportion of the portfolio.

Many years ago I started getting some enquiries from some market operators and they didn't know what to do with their stallholders because they couldn't get a policy which could wrap around and include the stallholders. And so we came up with the concept of putting an online system together.

The coverage is negligence based. The stallholders get cover if their product causes damage after they've sold it to the client, or if crazy little events happen – like not securing their umbrella properly on a windy day only for it to fly off and land on a Lamborghini. We've had a number of claims like that. Fortunately no umbrellas have flown off and hit anyone in the eye!

So I found a gap in the market many years ago and we just fine-tuned it over the last 10 years with MyMarketInsurance.

How did you start out in broking?

I was first year out of school in 1977, didn't want to go to university and I was just looking for some sort of clerical type job. I had no idea what broking was.

My very first job was to calculate the Workers Compensation premium in NSW for BHP, you can’t start much bigger than that. There was a team of four and I was clearly number four and had to do the calculations.

I've got a bit of a mathematical brain. In a past life I was a bookmaker’s clerk, you have to be pretty nimble with figures to be writing down bookmaker’s bets.

Some 14 years ago I started as an Authorised Rep. This is the third tough market that I've seen over the years, it's a cyclical thing. I’m sure it's been a bit of a shock to some younger brokers but as long as you've got good relationships with your clients, and you can properly explain what's going on, you'll be fine.

What do you do for fun?

It's been a fantastic industry because even from my first job, I've met people who are now my best friends.

I have a group of ten or so mates that have worked together over the years and we go away on annual trips, I think we're doing number 35 this year. It's despite the fact we all work or run businesses theoretically in competition to each other. We’re just great mates.

When we were a bit younger and not so affluent, we would go to Adelaide or Hobart or something like that for a boys’ weekend. Now we've snuck in a couple of overseas trips to Hong Kong and the States – just a reflection of the fact that the boys are probably earning a few more dollars than they did back in the early days.