Snippets from the industry

A Norwich Union staff member had a potentially career-shortening moment recently when he made a joke - at chief executive Patrick Snowball's expense. While at an in-house seminar in an atrium-domed conference hall, Snowball's speech and Powerpoint presentation were going well, until the sun broke through the clouds, flooded through the glass roof, rendering the presentation screen completely bleached out and unreadable. The show went on but afterwards, referring to the sun's sudden appearance, the cheeky chappy in question quipped: "I didn't see you bend down during the speech, Mr Snowball," inferring the sunshine came from his backside.

After a heavily pregnant pause, Snowball smiled and said: "That's funny."

Agricultural insurance specialist FarmWeb is due to celebrate its 1000th policy, the result of a collaboration with RBS, in a way that Overheard is concerned may be misconstrued. Rather than issue "boring pictures of men in suits", they have opted to photograph the men in suits with three magnums of champagne and some sheep on the Yorkshire moors. Make your own minds up.