How to Outsource New Business Submissions

What Is a New Business Submission in Commercial Lines?

A new business submission is the package your agency sends to a carrier's underwriting department when quoting a new commercial account. It includes completed ACORD forms, loss runs from the prior carrier, line-specific supplemental applications, and any supporting documents the underwriter needs to assess the risk. Assembling it correctly is document-intensive—and it is where a trained remote VA adds the most immediate value.

In commercial lines, each carrier has slightly different requirements, but the core package is consistent across markets. For a standard account you will typically need:

• ACORD 125 (Commercial Insurance Application) plus line-specific supplementals — ACORD 140 for property, ACORD 130 for GL, ACORD 163 for workers' comp
• Five years of loss runs from the prior carrier (or a statement of no prior coverage)
• Carrier-specific supplemental applications for specialty coverage — professional liability, cyber, inland marine, umbrella
• Supporting documents: financials, property photos, vehicle schedules, payroll breakdowns, or description-of-operations detail

For a single new commercial account, assembling this package manually takes a producer or CSR between 90 minutes and four hours—depending on how quickly loss runs arrive and how many supplementals the account requires. That time is the opportunity cost you eliminate when you delegate the build.

Why Your Producers Should Not Build Submission Packages

A producer's time is worth most in front of the prospect—building trust, asking the right questions, negotiating terms. Every hour spent pulling loss runs, filling ACORD fields, and navigating carrier portals is an hour not spent closing new business or deepening a renewal relationship.

There is also an E&O dimension. When producers build packages under time pressure—between client calls, before a coverage deadline—errors slip through: wrong form version, missing loss run period, blank supplemental fields. According to IIABA guidance on preparing a winning underwriting submission, incomplete or poorly organized packages go to the bottom of the underwriter's queue—and in a hard market, that can cost you the account. A trained VA who owns the build, follows a documented SOP, and delivers a clean package every time solves both the time problem and the quality problem.

Once the build is delegated, a producer can run three or four submissions in parallel without a bottleneck—because the production work is happening concurrently while they stay focused on prospect relationships.

What a Trained VA Can Handle in the Submission Process

A trained VA can handle every step between 'we have a prospect' and 'the package is ready for your review': gathering documents from the client, completing ACORD forms, requesting and organizing loss runs, populating carrier supplemental applications, and assembling the final package with a cover sheet.

Here is a standard six-step workflow you can adapt for your agency:

Step 1: Intake. VA receives the completed intake form (or pulls existing data from the AMS). Confirms lines of coverage being quoted, identifies the correct ACORD forms and carrier-specific requirements, and flags any missing information before proceeding.

Step 2: Loss run request. VA emails the prior carrier(s) with a standard loss run request letter (template lives in the SOP). Tracks outstanding requests in the AMS and follows up at the 48-hour mark if no response.

Step 3: ACORD form completion. VA populates the relevant ACORD forms from the intake data, pre-filling any fields already in the AMS. Flags incomplete fields for producer clarification rather than guessing. Uses the agency's approved form library to ensure the correct version for each carrier.

Step 4: Supplemental applications. VA completes carrier-specific and line-specific supplementals. For specialty lines—cyber, E&O, D&O, professional liability—routes to the producer for review earlier in the process, since those forms often require coverage knowledge.

Step 5: Package assembly. VA compiles the full submission—ACORD forms, loss runs, supplementals, and supporting documents—into a single organized package. Creates a cover sheet with the account summary, quote requirements, and any producer notes. Delivers the package to the producer's review queue in the AMS.

Step 6: Producer review and submission. Producer reviews the assembled package, adds the coverage recommendation and any pricing notes, and submits to the carrier. This step keeps the producer's expertise and credentials in the loop at the final point of control.

What to Standardize in Your SOP

A working submissions SOP has three core components: an intake checklist (what to collect from the prospect), a form library (which ACORD forms and supplementals apply to each line your agency writes), and a QA step where the producer verifies accuracy before the package goes to the carrier.

Intake checklist: Business name, FEIN, years in business, description of operations, prior carrier and policy number, current premium, five-year loss history, locations and square footage, vehicle schedules, employee count, annual revenue, and any pending claims. Anything not collected at intake will need to be chased down mid-build, which stalls the SLA.

Form library: A reference document organized by line of coverage (property, GL, workers' comp, commercial auto, inland marine, umbrella, specialty) listing the required ACORD forms and any carrier-specific supplementals for the markets you submit to regularly. Keeping this library current is a quarterly maintenance task—form versions update, and an outdated form can cause a carrier to reject the submission.

QA checklist: The producer's review at Step 6 should be structured—not a casual skim. A 10-point QA checklist covering lines of coverage, limits, effective dates, loss run period, and completeness of supplementals gives you an E&O control point without turning review into a rebuild.

If you have not yet built out process documentation for your agency, documenting your agency workflows before deploying a VA is the right order of operations—the VA can only follow a process that exists.

Finding and Onboarding a Remote VA for Submissions

Look for commercial lines experience and ACORD form familiarity—ideally combined with proficiency in at least one AMS. A candidate who already knows the forms and understands the language of underwriting can be running independent submission builds within two to three weeks. Someone learning from scratch takes eight to twelve weeks to reach the same productivity.

Key skills to screen for: ACORD form knowledge, AMS experience (Applied Epic, AMS360, HawkSoft, or EZLynx), strong written English for loss run request and follow-up emails, attention to detail, and comfort tracking multiple open submissions in parallel. A background in commercial lines account service or underwriting support is the clearest signal.

The trend is toward AI-augmented outsourcing: a trained VA using submission automation tools to handle higher volume without sacrificing accuracy. Insurance Journal's analysis of AI-assisted BPO for insurance submissions describes the next-generation model as blending human insurance expertise with AI tools for scalable, accurate submission processing—which is exactly what a well-trained remote VA with AMS and ACORD proficiency brings to an independent agency.

The onboarding sequence: start with three to five supervised submission builds, where the producer reviews every step. Then move to independent builds with producer QA at the final package. By week four, a qualified VA should be managing eight to ten active submissions simultaneously without escalation. If you are also considering a broader underwriting support role, Remote Underwriting Assistant: Agency Guide covers how to scope that role beyond submissions.

The remote model fits the role well. Submission work is screen-based, asynchronous-friendly, and document-driven—there is no reason it needs to happen in your office. A vetted remote insurance professional with commercial lines experience and Eastern Time overlap can cover your full submission pipeline without the overhead of an in-house hire. For a growing commercial book, that is one of the fastest ways to expand capacity without expanding your fixed cost base.

Delegation is most effective when the broader delegation model in your agency is already defined—submissions are one workflow in a larger system of producer-VA division of labor.