Lancaster, Pa.-based Eastern Alliance Insurance Group’s first alternative market program is now its largest association program.

EAIG is celebrating 10 years of partnering with the Pennsylvania Builders Association, for which it serves as the underwriter for the PBA’s Workers’ Compensation Program. The program offers PBA members, typically homebuilders and remodeling contractors, and those who provide members with products and services, access to workers’ compensation insurance products and services.

Over the last decade, the program doubled in membership and its premium volume grew eightfold, with $7.2 million in direct written premium, as of Dec. 31, 2008.

The program has been administered by E.K. McConkey and Co., an independent agency based in York, Pa., since 2005. McConkey acts as a liaison between the PBA and EAIG, assisting in annual program renewal negotiations and developing marketing plans, while serving as a marketing and sales resource for the agents authorized to conduct business for the program.

The program loss ratio has decreased to less than half of its 1999 number, a fact attributed to EAIG’s focus on claim and risk management, said Bruce Eckert, CEO of EAIG’s parent company, Eastern Insurance Holdings Inc.

Jon Grella, chief financial officer for the PBA, said nearly 70 of its members have renewed their policies for 10 consecutive years, which “demonstrates the program’s tremendous value” as an added benefit to members.

In 2008, the program set a record, with more than $1 million in new business written and also expanded into Maryland.

This story originally appeared in the May 2009 print edition of Insurance & Financial Advisor.