Bidvest Life, which rebranded from its previous moniker FMI earlier in 2022, is planning to add digital channels to its distribution model and revise its , disability and life insurance offering to appeal to the wider SA market.
This is partly due to the effect of the Covid-19 pandemic, which highlighted the need for the company to widen its appeal beyond its traditional middle- to higher-income customer base that is mainly reached via independent financial advisers (IFAs).
CEO Lulu Rasebotsa, who joined the group in October 2021, say Bidvest Life wants to eventually expand its distribution model to include call centres and digital channels, though she stresses IFAs will remain important to how the insurer sells its products.
“We need to make our product set simpler to appeal to the broader SA market but to do that we need to give that market greater accessibility by using new distribution channels,” Rasebotsa told Business Day in an interview. “IFAs remain a key channel but it’s about greater diversity — we can’t just be centred on one product set, serving one particular market.”
Bidvest Life, which competes mainly with Hollard and Professional Provident Society (PPS), specifically wants to bolster its appeal to younger clients who are not only more digitally savvy but who can help the insurer reduce its risk profile as younger consumers are also typically healthier and less likely to suffer from poor health or disabilities.
It also wants to develop more simplified products that require minimal advice to make it easer to engage with a youth market that is typically more sceptical of the traditional insurance sales model, which involves sitting down with an IFA and undergoing a sometimes lengthy underwriting process.
“The youth are all about immediate gratification,” says Rasebotsa. “But the pandemic also taught us that we’ve got to be more digital. We’ll be driving digitisation quite aggressively.”
One potential product that Bidvest Life is considering is a funeral policy offering that incorporates the income protection cover on which its predecessor, FMI, built its reputation. FMI was among the first insurers in SA to specialise in income protection by specifically targeting small business owners and other self-employed individuals such as tradesmen and freelancers.
“SA’s traditional insurers only wanted to insure people who earned a regular income — they weren’t interested in insuring people like plumbers or people who ran their own businesses,” said Rasebotsa. “We want to insure anyone who earns an income. Anyone who earns an income needs income protection.”
Bidvest Life is also reviewing its mental health underwriting process, particularly in terms of client disclosures. This is partly in response to increased mental-health-related claims in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“For the longest time mental health has always been viewed as subjective, it’s difficult to diagnose and it’s difficult to determine exactly how long one should be off work because of it,” said Rasebotsa. “Mental health issues can also be related to substance abuse, so we are trying to get a more objective measure in terms of disclosures during the underwriting process.”
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