Scots insurance firms still eager to recruit

Amid hiring freezes and increasing numbers of redundancies within Scotland's financial services industry, one area seems to be continuing with healthy levels of hiring - insurance.

Owen Kelly, Scottish Financial Enterprise has singled out general insurance as being one sector north of the border yet to be overly squeezed by the financial crisis.

"Given the current economic climate, the general pessimism is not unexpected," he says. "But it is not all doom and gloom - financial services is a very diverse industry in Scotland and general insurance, for example, is more optimistic than banking."

Elaine McCrink, director of Elite Insurance Appointments, agrees that business is still booming.

"Normally, we could point to some particular area of activity - increased demand for development executives or claims handlers, for example - but really we're seeing healthy levels of recruitment from firms across the central belt. We simply do not have enough candidates," she says.

However, in spite of this positive sentiment, the last firm to announce significant expansion plans in Scotland was Aviva in July last year.

Margaret Dyer, director of Joslin Rowe's Scottish operations, says: "Overall, I'd say we had fewer new roles in insurance than in previous years. However, we still have a good flow of jobs, and firms are recruiting more than a lot of other financial services companies."

McCrink says that insurance firms are having difficulty prizing candidates out of their existing role, and are increasingly open to offering sign-on bonuses in order to secure the right recruit.

Not surprisingly, certain people are looking to move to the industry, she says: "Mortgage and investment consultants would like to get into the general insurance sector, but because it's a specialist skill-set the transition is difficult."