The check against the clubs' own documents
The P&I club comparison tool, which we are building for Gallagher Specialty and which carries Gallagher's brand, reads only published figures and holds no client or renewal data. Until this week a share of its figures, mostly in the older years, came from a secondary source. We set two rules for it. Every figure should be the club's own published figure wherever one exists, and a figure a club does not publish should never be assumed to be zero.
On 13 October we checked every secondary figure against the clubs' own documents: annual reports, policy year statements, circulars, solvency and financial condition reports, results releases, and S&P's research for ratings.
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884 figures now cite a club's own document
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238 of them have a new value
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646 were confirmed and now cite the club in place of the secondary source
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66 derived figures were worked out again
115 figures are now N/P: 109 zeros that no document states, and 6 investment returns the clubs do not publish
The 109 is the number that troubles us. No club document states any of those zeros. A zero now stays only where a document states it, and the tool will not publish with one that has no source. A figure that is still secondary says "No published figure found" and names where we looked.
What was wrong
Most differences between the two sources were differences of basis, and those stand. Some were plain errors.
The American Club's premium had been read from the written and billed line, which leaves out unbilled premium, and is now gross written premium for every year. Its free reserve and the Swedish Club's for 2018/19 and 2019/20 are now on the same basis as their later years. Britannia's 2019/20 investment allocation held another club's figures. Gard's 2023/24 policy-year combined ratio repeated the next year's figure. The UK Club's 2018/19 "capital distribution" was the repayment of a hybrid capital bond, not a return to members, and is now zero, as the documents state. Gard's 2024/25 share of policy-year premium, Shipowners' 2021/22 tonnage, Skuld's abatement threshold and the market's change in total tonnage for 2020/21 to 2022/23 are also corrected, and two 2025/26 S&P ratings we had not held are added. The market averages affected were worked out again. The 2025/26 averages do not move at one decimal place.
Two errors were our own. NorthStandard publishes only its equities share for 2018/19 to 2021/22, and the chart had stretched that share to fill the column, so those years read as 100% equities. The share is now drawn at its true size, with the rest of the column hatched N/P. The club list had also ranked some clubs on total tonnage and others on owned tonnage, which left the London Club reading "Rank N/P". It now ranks by owned GT, the figures the rank chart draws.
One club first, then the comparison
The tool now opens on Review, one club at a time, starting with Gard, the largest club by owned GT. Its Overview gives the club's key figures in four panels and six charts, and every row of the club's table of figures is charted on the tab for its section. Review shows that club and the market average only.
Compare draws every club selected on the same eight tabs, one measure to a chart. Up to four clubs appear as clustered bars or lines with a key. From five, each club has a line named at its end, or a small chart of its own on one scale. Ranks are a bump chart. Any number of the 12 clubs can be compared at once, and the four comparison views of early October are withdrawn.
How the charts are drawn
A figure a club does not publish is never drawn as a gap or as a zero. It is hatched N/P where it would stand and keyed, in the expanded chart, the export and the printout as well as on the page.
Compare no longer has a second value axis, because with several clubs overlaid a second line read as though it were plotted against the bars. Review keeps its second axes, and each pair now shares its zero and its gridlines.
Each club has one fixed colour, the same in every section, and a club's colour is never used for a category. The two smallest clubs, Shipowners and the American Club, share a colour with Gard and NorthStandard respectively. Dashes and hatching tell them apart, and the Definitions tab says so.
Where small charts share one scale, the scale fits most clubs. A figure beyond it is cut at the edge with an arrowhead, labelled with its value and named in the note. Nothing is hidden. Rank axes run to 13, the number of clubs before North and Standard merged in 2023.
A view of the market
A third section, Market, shows the International Group market year by year across 25 tabs, under market overview and industry statistics. It has no club selection and highlights no club. A figure not published is hatched N/P here too.
The Market figures carry a limit. For now they come from a secondary source rather than the clubs' own reports, and where one differs from a club's own figure, the Sources tab says so.
What is still open
Every policy-year figure for 2025/26 is N/P, because the year is still open. Figures that no club document gives, such as most tonnage at renewal and the market shares and ranks, remain on the secondary source, each saying so. The London Club's 2025/26 rating will be checked against its accounts to 20 February 2026 once they are filed.
The figures are still read by hand. Gallagher has not yet agreed them, and they should be checked before anyone relies on them. The tool runs on a preview host until Gallagher decides where it is hosted and how people sign in. Its branding awaits Gallagher's brand review, and its Terms of use, Privacy policy and Cookie policy await review by a qualified adviser.