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Svenja Richartz joins Stichling Hahn Hilbrich

Svenja Richartz and Jürgen Hahn
Svenja Richartz and Jürgen Hahn (© Stichling Hahn Hilbrich)

The general average loss adjusters Stichling Hahn Hilbrich will be under twin management in the future.

The new managing director, Svenja Richartz, is set to replace owner Jürgen Hahn over the long term.

A changing of the guard is on the horizon at the Hamburg adjusters Stichling Hahn Hilbrich. At the start of the year, owner Jürgen Hahn took on a partner in his highly traditional company. The second managing director and minority shareholder is now Dr. Svenja Richartz. With a doctorate in law, she is also the first Chair of the Hanseatic Insurance Exchange (formerly the Hamburg Insurance Exchange), last worked for the Hanseatic Broking Center brokerage group and was previously managing director of the Mund & Fester insurance agency.

Richartz entering a male domain

The long-term plan is for Richartz to succeed Jürgen Hahn, one of the highest-profile adjusters in the country. The man with a degree in marine engineering has been with the company since 1979 and the sole owner since 2016. Until such time as she replaces him, Richartz must familiarise herself in the coming years with the highly complex material of an average adjuster and must then be sworn in by the chamber of commerce.

These specialists handle general average cases in which parties involved in the shipping company and the cargo have to jointly cover the cost of salvage from a common peril, and they draw up loss distribution plans for this purpose. Richartz would thus be the first woman to encroach on a classic male domain with scarcely a dozen participants in Germany. The Association of German Average Adjusters only numbers nine members on its website, all of whom are male.

Speaking to HANSA, Richartz declared that it gave her great pleasure to help shape the future of such a traditional company in an important niche of the maritime sector. Top of her agenda were visits to clients among insurance brokers, shipyards and shipping companies, she explained. “And the next challenge will be to gradually work my way into the day-to-day business.” Richartz started her career in the 1990s, training as an insurance broker, taking a law degree in Hamburg and completing a doctorate in marine insurance law.

“Experienced, competent insurance manager”

Hahn and his new co-managing director have known each other for years through their joint commitment to the Hanseatic Insurance Exchange. He was delighted, he stated, to have recruited an “experienced and competent insurance manager” in the shape of Richartz to enable business in the area of major claims in the maritime industry to be further expanded. Furthermore, Emilia Hahn and Prodromos Laskaridis have also joined the team, both of them as claims adjusters.

Stichling Hahn Hilbrich was founded in 1908 and employs a total of nine staff at its registered head office in Hamburg and its London office. (mph)