Claims Transformation and Operational Excellence with David Fernandez from Kingstone Insurance

<p>David Fernandez, Chief Claims Officer at Kingstone Insurance, joins host James Benham to explore claims transformation, operational excellence, and why the team comes before the technology.</p><p><br></p><p>David fell into claims almost by accident: a broken-down car and a newspaper ad for a claims rep trainee job at Progressive, one that came with a company car, started an 18-year run there. </p><p><br></p><p>A decade at Liberty Mutual followed, then stops at Unum and Point32Health, and now three years as Chief Claims Officer at Kingstone Insurance, where he has helped lead the company&#39;s turnaround.</p><p><br></p><p>In this episode:<br>• Claims quality is a grind, not a project. It is won file by file, day after day, until it becomes how the team works, not something you launch and move past.</p><p><br>• Why &quot;until you have a team that you believe in, you&#39;re swimming up river&quot; is the foundation every other fix in a claims org sits on top of.</p><p><br>• How a small, empowered team rebuilt Kingstone&#39;s claims platform in four months, with clear ownership and not a single slide deck.</p><p><br>• Why making no decision is worse than making a suboptimal one, and how giving people room to admit mistakes keeps a transformation moving.</p><p><br>• Inside Kingstone&#39;s catastrophe playbook, built for a Northeast climate that delivered 11 declared catastrophes in the first quarter alone.</p><p><br></p><p>Key Quotes:<br>&quot;We sell a piece of paper and a promise. Sometimes it&#39;s a PDF.&quot;</p><p><br>&quot;Making no decision is worse than making a suboptimal decision.&quot;</p><p><br>&quot;Until you have a team that you believe in, you are swimming up river.&quot;</p><p><br>&quot;There was not a single slide for that whole thing.&quot;</p><p><br></p><p>🔗 Connect: David Fernandez, Kingstone Insurance links<br>👤 Host: James Benham<br>🎙️ Terra sponsor block + InsurTech Geek socials + standard sign-off (unchanged, copied from the standing footer)</p>