Aon suit against JLT due to airline account

The move of a major Taiwanese airline account is at the centre of Aon's decision to sue Jardine Lloyd Thompson, Reinsurance has learned.

Reinsurance can reveal that China Airlines and its subsidiary Mandarin Airlines was won from Aon by Jardine Lloyd Thompson in the recent round of airline brokerage renewals.

A few months ago Aon's deputy chairman Bill Smith, Jonathan Palmer-Brown, and Hong Kong-based broker Martin Trumper all left the broker and moved to JLT.

Since both the brokers and the accounts moved, Aon has sued Jardine Lloyd Thompson, as revealed by Reinsurace on September 30th.

When Reinsurance contacted Aon about the court proceedings at the end of September, an Aon spokesman did not mention their former employees, but admitted legal action was taking place: "I can confirm that we have initiated legal proceedings that relate to our enforcement of the contractual and fiduciary duties of our employees and the protection of Aon's confidential information. The decision to initiate legal proceedings is never taken lightly. The movement of employees from one company to another is a normal feature of our marketplace. However, where we believe employees are breaching their legal obligations, we will not shy from taking appropriate action against them and other involved parties."

At the time of Reinsurance's first article about the court proceedings, JLT did not comment further apart from admitting that it was in legal proceedings with Aon.

A spokesperson from JLT said: "Whilst JLT decline to talk about any specific legal proceedings, it is unfortunate that this type of litigation is not uncommon when an employer becomes concerned by the number of senior departures it is seeing move to a major competitor".

Aon could not be reached for comment.