Sun Life of Canada (Philippines) Inc. (Sun Life) remains the top life insurance company in the Philippines with premium income reaching P32 billion in 2017, based on a recent report released by the Insurance Commission (IC).
Based on a report by the IC, Sun Life sustained its leadership for the seventh consecutive year after attaining the highest total premium income in 2017 of P32.114 billion, inching up by 0.7 percent from premium income of P31.890 billion in 2016.
“This milestone is one we attribute to our clients, whose trust and support inspire us to keep improving and innovating. We also have our advisers, employees and partners to thank, for it is through their hard work and passion that we are able to touch the lives of more Filipinos,” Sun Life President Alexander S. Narciso said.
Narciso recounted how Sun Life advisors rallied to serve more clients in 2017, despite some challenges in the market. In 2017 its first year premium income from the sale of traditional and variable insurance products reached P5.784 billion, an expansion by 12.7 percent from P5.132 billion in 2016.
“In fact, in the last quarter of 2017, our advisers settled P2 billion in annualized first year premium, the company’s highest in the past five years,” he added.
The Sun Life group of companies grew its client base to over 3 million and its advisory force is now over 11,000
as at end-2017.
“We are on track to realizing our ‘RI5E PH’ vision of having 5 million clients by 2020,” Sun Life Philippines CEO and Country Head Rizalina G. Mantaring said.
For 2018 Sun Life plans to tap broader markets, launch new products and offer more digital tools while continuously enhancing its client service.
Earlier, Mantaring told the BusinessMirror that one way for insurance companies to gain a wider reach of the market is for the IC to allow know-your-client (KYC) sessions via video calls, among other proposals.
“A few others would help boost the growth of the industry, such as allowing KYC sessions to be done via video calls. This would help reach a bigger population as it would facilitate selling via other distribution channels such as online and affinity marketing,” Mantaring said.
She also said allowing insurance companies to invest in infrastructure more is a challenge that needs to be addressed.
“In terms of challenges, one of our main ones is finding assets that give the necessary yield for traditional products, and assets with long enough durations. Infrastructure investments would be ideal. So the IC can facilitate infrastructure investing by no longer requiring approval for individual investments as long as they are intended for approved government
infrastructure projects,” she added.