Underwriting firm, Prestige Assurance plc, is redefining its operational strategies that would not only enable it deepen presence in the domestic market, but control a larger share of the nation’s insurance businesses.
The company, which draws its origin from the New India Assurance Company Limited, a global brand in risk management having existed in the Nigerian market for over 63 years, is poised for change, having appointed a new management.
Prestige Assurance, at an evening dinner with top insurance brokers and reinsurance companies in Lagos, and attended by its global chairman and managing director of New India Assurance Company, Gopalan Srinivasan, said it was a new dawn for the company.
Balla Swamy, managing director, Prestige Assurance, said: “We are changing our strategy and building a stronger relationship with the brokers and other stakeholders in the industry.”
The company has just inaugurated a customer portal, broker portal and agency portal with cutting-edge technology that makes that business exciting and interesting for all stakeholders, Swamy said, and this will enable them generate insurance certificates online real-time, once premiums were paid.
He said the company was working on innovative products that will endear it closer to Nigerians and for the benefit of Nigerians, assuring that it had the capacity to meet all genuine claims with specified time of 30 working days.
The company has continued to make positive landmarks, he said, having settled big claims like the Dana Air crash claims, while its recent rights issue was also successfully oversubscribed to about 113 percent.
Srinivasan, who was happy with his coming to Nigeria at this time after a successful general elections, said he was excited about the economic prospect of the country, saying “Nigeria today occupies a very important place in the comity of nation’s, particularly in the wealth of its human resource capital.”
According to him, New India Assurance with premium income of over $2.6 billion and asset base of $10 billion, as of the end of 2014, and having Prestige among its 2,200 offices globally would be prepared to lead its Nigeria subsidiary to top height.
New India has over 170 products and would assist Prestige, which currently has just 7 products, to boost its market offering for the benefit of majority of Nigerians, the global chairman said, saying “we want to give a new direction to Prestige Assurance. Our strength is in our ability to give innovative products, render quality customer service and settle genuine claims as promptly as possible.”
Modestus Anaesoronye
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