phone: 1 952 548-1200
fax: 1 952 548 1211
SENIOR
BROKERS
- Mark Abicht - President
Mark Abicht is the President of A&H Intermediaries. He has well over two decades of experience in the insurance and reinsurance industry.
Mark started his career in the reinsurance industry in 1987 when he worked as a treaty accountant for E.W. Blanch Company, now AON Benfield. Mark left E.W. Blanch in 1988 to join Reinsurance Alternatives/Willis Re, where he became Senior Vice President and Manager; Life, Accident and Health.
Mark's responsibilities at Willis Re/RAI included the management of the Life, Accident and Health broker team and the production and servicing of his own book of business. Willis Re/RAI handled approximately $1 billion of reinsurance premium annually.
In 2001 Mark, along with three partners, formed A&H Intermediaries, LLC. They created a unique, independent reinsurance intermediary that focuses primarily on clients in the Life, Accident and Health field.
Mark earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Accounting from the University of North Dakota and shortly thereafter passed the CPA exam.
- Bruce Horner - Chief Executive Officer
Bruce Horner, as Chief Executive Officer of A&H Intermediaries, brings almost three decades of insurance and reinsurance management experience to the table along with his background in law.
Bruce is a key player in the reinsurance industry. His career began at E.W. Blanch Co., now AON Benfield. He worked there for ten years, leaving the position to join Reinsurance Alternatives/Willis Re as Senior Vice President. Bruce played a major part in growing the company/division into one that handled approximately one $1 billion of reinsurance premium annually.
In 2001, after eleven years at Willis Re, Bruce formed A&H Intermediaries, LLC with three partners. They wanted to create a unique and independent reinsurance intermediary that is more responsive to their clients.
Bruce's focus is on the Life, Accident and Health field including; First Dollar Medical Insurance, Self Funded Medical Insurance, Critical Illness, Catastrophic Life Reinsurance, Program Business, Personal Accident and Sickness and Retrocessions.
Bruce earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Minnesota and a Juris Doctorate from William Mitchell College of Law.
- Linda Rasula - Vice President
Linda brings to A&H Intermediaries over two decades of reinsurance and insurance experience. She began her career at E.W. Blanch, now AON/Benfield as a treaty accountant and then moved over to the reinsurance/broker area where she has spent the majority of her career. Her understanding of the medical marketplace and its complex issues immediately provided significant support to the production team.
Linda left E.W. Blanch (now AON/Benfield) in 1995 to join the Reinsurance Alternatives/Willis broker team and became Assistant Vice President. She joined A&H Intermediaries as Vice President at its inception in 2001.
Linda's responsibilities are predominately dedicated to the servicing of existing business. The Life, Accident and Health business that Linda services includes a significant volume of medical stop loss as well as provider excess, life, sports disability, medical excess, pet insurance, first dollar medical business along with personal accident business.
Linda earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Minnesota State University, Mankato, graduating Magna Cum Laude. She has also earned her Associate of Reinsurance and Associate of Insurance Accounting and Finance designations.
SENIOR
OPERATIONS
- Stephen Bauman, Senior Development Consultant
Steve Bauman has been in software development since 1996. He has extensive experience with Visual Basic, ActiveX, XML, ODBC, OLE DB, and Microsoft Transaction Server. He also has experience with Access, SQL Server, Crystal Reports, HTML (and Dynamic HTML), Active Server Pages, Internet Information Server (IIS), Basic, Object-Oriented design/development, and Visual SourceSafe. Steve is a Microsoft Certified Professional in Visual Basic and desktop applications, Windows Open System Architecture (I & II), Analyzing Requirements and Defining Solutions Architectures, and SQL Server.
When working at Willis, Steve gained extensive experience in the reinsurance industry, working closely with upper management, brokers, contract writers and accountants. His responsibilities included architecture design, database design, development and implementation. The architecture included asynchronous processing, Distributed COM, ODBC & OLEDB (using ADO), and intrinsic and third party windows controls. Steve also designed his own ActiveX components for use in the system to make development easier and faster.
Steve consulted for Magenic Technologies, a Microsoft Solution Provider, prior to joining Willis. It was here that he earned his Microsoft Certified Solution Developer title, as well as becoming familiar with the Microsoft Solutions Framework methodology of application development. Steve continues to maintain relationships with expert consultants.
Steve also was a developer at Schwan's Sales Enterprises. He acted as a mentor to new developers, as well as designing and coding Microsoft Transaction Server components and applications, developing a food-court sales/reporting system, and creating reports using Crystal Reports. There he learned and applied Windows standards, Java, JavaScript, VBScript, and HTML. Steve also created the pilot for Tony's Pizza.
- Russel Funk - Chief Financial Officer
Russ began his work in the insurance industry in 1974, with significant management responsibilities beginning in 1978. Early in his career he quickly developed the necessary management skills and strong business fundamentals to lead large areas within an organization.
As Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of Reinsurance Alternatives (subsequently acquired by Willis Re), the dominant Life, Accident & Health reinsurance intermediary-broker in the reinsurance marketplace at the time. Russ' responsibilities were to determine mission, vision, goals and direction for all administrative areas of the corporation. The administrative areas included treaty accounts, contract writing, information systems, corporate accounting and budgeting, human resources, and risk management.
Prior to Russ' arrival at Reinsurance Alternatives/Willis in 1989, Russ managed the treaty accounts and claims operation for E. W. Blanch Co. (now AON/Benfield) beginning in 1980. Russ was instrumental in the design and development of management systems that provided the user with significant management information and provided the necessary accounting and claims information to reinsurers. Russ' knowledge base benefited from his involvement in the direct side of the insurance business during the 1970's. He began his career in 1973 as an insurance examiner with the State of Minnesota auditing Life, Accident & Health and Property & Casualty companies. Russ also worked as the Director of Accounting for the John Alden property/ casualty companies and for the Title Insurance companies of the St. Paul Companies during the 1970's. During his involvement with those companies he prepared GAAP and Statutory financial statements as well as managing the staff responsible for the daily accounting activities.
Russ earned a Bachelor of Science in Business degree from the University of Minnesota, Carlson School of Management in 1970, and was honorably discharged from the U. S. Army in 1972.
- Jeffrey Kuhs - Chief Operations Officer
Jeffrey Kuhs began working in the insurance industry in 1990. He has since compiled a long track record of corporate and information technology success.
As a corporate Assistant Vice President of Reinsurance Alternatives/Willis, Jeffrey managed the IT department and represent corporate IT concerns at the executive level. During this period, he oversaw the maturation of several major industry specific projects including two reinsurance intermediary accounting applications, a large scale accounting application, a multi-faceted web initiative and the implementation of a document management system.
He has since worked in many different corporate areas, but with a continued focus on corporate management and information technology. He has managed several large scale corporate initiatives, gaining extensive logistical and international business experience in the processes. He has major work experience in over 12 countries in North America, Europe and Asia. Projects he controlled consisted of multimillion dollar budgets with over 100 team members.
In addition to being an certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and Six Sigma green belt, Jeffrey is ITIL, Microsoft Solutions Framework, Microsoft Operations Framework and COBIT (Control Objectives for Information and related Technology) trained.
Jeffrey earned a Bachelor of Science in Business degree from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota with an emphasis on Information Decision Science. In addition to national merit recognition, he has received multiple academic honors.
TIP