With more than 200 insurance policies placed globally, Chad C. Jackson has devised and optimized a framework around FedEx Corp.'s insurance programs that has reduced costs.

But before Mr. Jackson assumed leadership of the corporate risk management team, FedEx's insurance programs were decentralized due to the varying risk and insurance needs of the company's eight operating companies, and there was little focus on coordinating efforts to improve coverage.

Currently, Mr. Jackson, Memphis, Tenn.-based staff director of risk management for FedEx, works with his team to get the right insurance program that meets the operating companies' needs and, when appropriate, consolidate insurers.

As a result of program design changes and increased retentions, Mr. Jackson helped FedEx reduce its total cost of risk by about $30 million in the past three years.

FedEx's risk management and insurance programs are complex, with a broad range of exposures. Risk finance and cross-operating company strategies are ultimately made at the corporate level, while claims management and day-to-day risk management interactions are handled at the operating company level.

Mr. Jackson has streamlined and consolidated FedEx's insurance into five major categories for renewals to simplify discussions: aviation, property, casualty, financial and specialty.

“Beyond those five categories of insurance, we said, "Where can we consolidate insurers?' “ he said.

For example, FedEx at one point had four different auto insurers, Mr. Jackson said, noting that its ground fleet includes more 90,000 motorized vehicles.

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The company faced a similar situation with workers compensation coverage.

To optimize coverage, Mr. Jackson's team negotiated with insurers, but the team also included individual operating companies in the discussions to make sure their needs were being met, Mr. Jackson said.

“We can use the buying power of FedEx Corp. with (the insurer consolidations) rather than having it disaggregated,” he said of efforts that resulted in much of the savings for FedEx.

To address escalating self-insured and insured losses within one unspecified operating unit of the company and to prevent the losses from getting worse, Mr. Jackson and his team made changes.

“We really needed to have skin in the game. Also, I just felt we were burning insurer bridges by making them pay out more in losses than they were paying in premiums for several years in a row,” Mr. Jackson said.

FedEx tripled one of its auto retentions to keep management focused on self-insured losses, but also recognized that the company needs its insurers to protect the balance sheet for the long term, he said.

“We've essentially done that,” Mr. Jackson said. “Ninety-eight percent of our risk is with one auto insurer. Ninety-eight percent of our risk is with one work comp insurer.”

That consolidation resulted in $7 million in premium savings in 2010 for FedEx, Mr. Jackson said.

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Such insurance program reforms don't happen overnight, Mr. Jackson said.

“We'll take several changes over two or three years to get there,” he said.

To achieve savings across the company's insurance programs, trust with underwriters is critical, Mr. Jackson said. FedEx works with its brokers throughout the year to facilitate strategic conversations with underwriters, which go beyond the typical renewal dialogue.

“Chad takes a very strategic and a long-term approach with the way he deals with markets and the way he wants FedEx to be seen in the market,” said Wynne Sharpe, vice president and account executive at Aon Risk Solutions in Houston. The Aon P.L.C. unit handles FedEx's foreign and global casualty property, aviation, and global cargo and logistics liabilities, among others.

“He wants the market to really understand FedEx's underlying operations,” Mr. Sharpe said.

“He certainly doesn't view the insurance market as a commodity play. I think he sees the long-term value in these partnerships, whether it's the aviation side, cargo side or the property side,” he said.

“He's always taken the time to educate us about the corporate culture of FedEx so that we can best respond to the company's insurance and risk management needs,” said David Homcy, Atlanta-based senior vice president and branch manager at Ace USA. Ace handles FedEx's risk management workers comp program.

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Streamlining insurance programs across multiple operating companies is a big undertaking, Mr. Homcy said.

Mr. Jackson's “approach to risk is really to educate us on the insurance and risk management needs so that we can conceptualize how to approach the insurance solutions,” Mr. Homcy said.

FedEx's basic philosophy is that insurance is purchased to protect against balance sheet volatility, Mr. Jackson said.

“If we ... bought the cheapest insurance premiums possible at the bottom of the insurance market, that volatility is going to hit us either after a major loss or in a hard market,” he said.

“We play the soft market for the hard market. That's really important to us,” Mr. Jackson said.