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Engineering Blog · Post #26

Configurable Corporate Clearance Rules: How InsightUW Lets You Define, Manage, and Enforce Compliance at Scale

How InsightUW's rules engine evaluates 11 default clearance rules across 6 categories — sanctions, capacity, territory, broker standing, LOB restrictions, and compliance — all admin-configurable from the Platform Features UI.


The Problem

Corporate clearance is not optional — it is the regulatory and operational gate between a new submission and an underwriter's quote. Every carrier enforces clearance rules, but most do it through a patchwork of spreadsheets, tribal knowledge, and manual checklists. The compliance team maintains one list of sanctioned territories. The capacity management team tracks aggregate limits in a separate workbook. Broker standing checks live in yet another system.

The result is inconsistency. One underwriter remembers the new moratorium on coastal property; another does not. A submission slips through without an OFAC check because the analyst assumed the broker portal handled it. When regulators ask for proof of systematic clearance enforcement, the carrier scrambles to reconstruct what happened from email trails and sticky notes.

What carriers need is a centralized, configurable rules engine — one that enforces every clearance rule on every submission, every time, with full auditability.

The InsightUW Approach

InsightUW ships with 11 default Corporate Clearance rules organized across 6 categories. Each rule is admin-managed from the Platform Features UI: toggle active/inactive, adjust thresholds, scope to specific LOBs, and define severity levels — all without writing a single line of code.

graph TD subgraph Submission["Incoming Submission"] A["SUB-2026-PR-0187<br/>Insured: Coastal Mfg Co<br/>LOB: Property<br/>Limit: $35M"] end subgraph Engine["Rules Engine — 6 Categories"] B["🛡️ Sanctions<br/>Sanc-001, Sanc-002, Sanc-003"] C["📊 Capacity<br/>CAP-001, LIM-001"] D["🌍 Territory<br/>Terr-001"] E["🏢 Broker Standing<br/>BRK-001, BRK-002"] F["📋 LOB Restriction<br/>LOB-001"] G["⚖️ Compliance<br/>Comp-001, Comp-002"] end subgraph Evaluate["Rule Evaluation"] H{"Each Rule:<br/>Active? LOB Scoped?<br/>Threshold Met?"} I["✅ Pass"] J["⚠️ Warn"] K["🚫 Fail"] end subgraph Result["Clearance Outcome"] L["Issues List<br/>+ Severity + Category"] M["AI Recommendations<br/>per Issue"] N["Clearance Status:<br/>cleared / pending / blocked"] end A --> B A --> C A --> D A --> E A --> F A --> G B --> H C --> H D --> H E --> H F --> H G --> H H -->|No Issues| I H -->|Advisory| J H -->|Blocking| K I --> L J --> L K --> L L --> M M --> N

The 11 Default Rules

InsightUW ships with these rules out of the box. Administrators can modify thresholds, toggle rules on/off, or add new custom rules from the Platform Features page.

Rule Code Category Description Default Threshold Severity
SANC-001 sanctions Insured name against OFAC/EU/UK lists 70% fuzzy match critical
SANC-002 sanctions Broker name sanctions screening 70% fuzzy match critical
SANC-003 sanctions Key principals/officers screening 70% fuzzy match critical
CAP-001 capacity Aggregate LOB capacity limit Per-LOB threshold high
LIM-001 capacity Large individual limit review $25M+ medium
TERR-001 territory Sanctioned territory check 8 territories critical
BRK-001 broker_standing Broker appointment verification Active required high
BRK-002 broker_standing Overdue balance / licensing check Configurable medium
LOB-001 lob_restriction LOB moratorium or pause Admin-set critical
COMP-001 compliance Regulatory filing requirement Per-state medium
COMP-002 compliance Surplus lines eligibility Jurisdiction rules medium

Admin-Managed Rule Configuration

Every rule exposes the same configuration interface in the Platform Features UI:

Field Description Example
rule code Unique identifier CAP-001
is active Toggle on/off without deleting true
threshold Numeric trigger value 100000000 ($100M)
severity critical / high / medium / low high
lob scope Apply to specific LOBs or all ["property", "casualty"]
description Human-readable rule text "Aggregate capacity limit per LOB"
action on fail block / warn / log block
updated by Last admin to modify compliance_admin@company.com
updated at Audit timestamp 2026-04-18T14:30:00Z

Toggling a rule to is_active: false immediately excludes it from all future clearance runs — no deployment needed, no code changes. The change is logged in the audit trail with the admin's identity and timestamp.

LOB-Scoped Rules

Not every rule applies to every line of business. A coastal property moratorium is irrelevant to a D&O submission. InsightUW supports LOB scoping at the rule level:

  • Global rules (no LOB scope): Sanctions checks apply to every submission regardless of LOB.
  • LOB-specific rules: A capacity limit of $100M for Property does not affect the Cyber LOB's separate $50M limit.
  • Multi-LOB rules: A single rule can target ["property", "inland_marine"] while excluding everything else.

When the rules engine evaluates a submission, it filters the active rules to only those whose lob scope includes the submission's LOB — or rules with no LOB scope (global).

Rule Evaluation Flow

For each active, LOB-matched rule, the engine:

  1. Fetches context — pulls the data the rule needs (sanctions lists, capacity totals, territory data, broker records)
  2. Evaluates condition — compares submission data against the rule's threshold or criteria
  3. Generates issue — if the condition triggers, creates a Clearance Issue with category, severity, description, and raw data
  4. Attaches AI recommendation — the AI service generates a recommended action, confidence score, and next steps for each issue

Rules execute in parallel where possible. A 6-category clearance check across 11 rules completes in under 3 seconds.

Configurable Thresholds in Practice

Rule Default Threshold Carrier A Override Carrier B Override
SANC-001 70% match 65% (more conservative) 75% (fewer false positives)
CAP-001 (Property) $100M $150M (larger book) $50M (startup carrier)
LIM-001 $25M $50M (large carrier) $10M (small carrier)
BRK-002 overdue $50K $25K (strict) $100K (relationship-driven)

Each threshold change is versioned. The system retains a complete history of rule configuration changes for regulatory examination.

Property LOB: Aggregate Capacity Rule Hits $100M Limit

Scenario: A Property submission arrives for Pacific Ridge Industrial Park, requesting a $15M limit. The Property LOB has a configured aggregate capacity of $100M.

Current book status:

Existing Bound Policies Limit Running Total
Sunrise Manufacturing Complex $25M $25M
Harbor View Office Tower $20M $45M
Great Plains Distribution Hub $30M $75M
Midwest Retail Portfolio $13M $88M

New submission: Pacific Ridge at $15M would bring the total to $103M — exceeding the $100M aggregate capacity.

Rule CAP-001 fires:

Field Value
Rule CAP-001: Aggregate LOB capacity limit
Category capacity
Severity high
Current utilization $88M / $100M = 88%
Proposed utilization $103M / $100M = 103%
Issue "Adding $15M limit would exceed Property LOB aggregate capacity of $100M by $3M (103% utilization)"
Action block

The underwriter sees this issue on the clearance panel with a red indicator. The AI recommendation suggests: "Escalate to Head of Property for capacity exception approval. Consider whether existing policies are approaching renewal and may not renew, freeing capacity. Alternative: reduce requested limit to $12M to stay within capacity."

What This Means for Underwriters

  1. No memorization required — every compliance rule is systematically enforced, not dependent on an individual's memory.
  2. Instant feedback — clearance issues surface the moment a submission enters the system, not after days of manual review.
  3. Admin empowerment — compliance teams manage rules directly through the UI. A new regulatory requirement becomes a rule configuration change, not a development project.
  4. Audit confidence — every rule evaluation, every threshold, every toggle change is logged with timestamps and user identity. Regulatory exams become a data export, not a document hunt.
  5. LOB flexibility — each line of business gets rules tailored to its risk profile, capacity constraints, and regulatory requirements.

What's Next

In the next post, we will explore Multi-Entity Sanctions Screening — how InsightUW checks not just the insured name, but also broker names and key principals against OFAC, EU, and UK sanctions lists using fuzzy matching with configurable thresholds.


InsightUW is an AI-powered underwriting workstation for P&C carriers. Request a demo to see the configurable clearance rules engine in action.

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