As insurers express commitment to the ongoing industry recapitalisation exercise, they have explained that a process is a form of a corporate reorganisation, which involves making substantial changes to a company’s capital structure.
It is one of the strategies companies use to improve their financial stability. Currently, the insurance industry, post recapitalisation, is expected to be robust and capable of taking big risks, as well as contribute meaningfully to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product.
Presently, some insurers are recording improved performances, which is boosting their chances to scale through the December 2020 deadline for the sector’s recapitalisation.
African Alliance Insurance Plc recorded a 45 percent jump in its Gross Premium Written (GPW), which moved from N5.17 billion in 2018, to N7.5 billion for the year ended 2019.
What this means to the industry is increased confidence of the policyholders in the uptake of more policies that would further boost the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the insurance industry.
According to the company’s recently released unaudited financials for 31 December 2019, its underwriting income grew from N5.11 billion to N6.94 billion representing a 36 per cent growth year-on-year while customer claims increased by 8 per cent year-on-year from N8.78 billion to N9.48 billion.
Speaking to The Guardian over the weekend, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, African Alliance, Funmi Omo, said the financial statement shows a marked progress in strategy to expand on retail presence and aggressively grow our market share despite suspending our largest line of business, annuity.“Our commitment to customer satisfaction is also clearly exemplified by our claims payment in the year 2019. For us, the customer is our life blood and we will always bend back to satisfy them every time they call on us,” Omo said.
On the sustainability of the business as a going concern, Omo allayed the fears of all stakeholders pointing to the various innovations that have taken place within the company over the past year.
“We have put in place a virile Business Continuity Plan (BCP) as a way of telling our shareholders and investors that we are indeed here for the long term while our investment portfolio is now being looked after by a smart team of experts with demonstrated accomplishments in the financial services.
“Internally, we have instituted a paperless policy that has seen our use of paper drop to a negligible minimum. We have put our sales team through various training and retraining; these are already yielding fruits as evidenced by the increased premium year on year.
“We are easily one of the most visible and engaging brand amongst our peers in the digital space. Indeed, we are not relenting in our drive to ensure we remain true to our commitment to be with the customer for life,” she posited.
Recall that the 60-year-old company, at its 50th yearly general meeting, had identified a combination of tactics, including share restructuring, private placements and capital injection among others, to meet the minimum capital requirements as stipulated by the industry regulator.