An average human being, especially the one who earns a monthly salary, tends to hoard his earnings instead of investing them for wealth generation. This is mostly due to a lack of confidence in most of the financial schemes or due to general anxiety. Insurance has traditionally been one mechanism that not only provides safety and security but also promotes economic growth along with savings.
With most of the health organizations across the globe declaring that the worst of the pandemic is behind us, the global economic recovery is imminent in 2022. According to a report by Moody, the global life insurers’ investment margins will remain squeezed despite rebounding bond yields. The same report claims that the social issues and regulatory changes will gradually reshape insurance demands and sales practices.
The global market size for the insurance sector is expected to cross over 6,390 billion USD by 2025. The US holds the biggest market share for the insurance industry, followed closely by China and subsequently by some of the European countries. So, a rising market leader in Asia does tend to grab the attention of the world. International Business Magazine came across Cocolife, a leading insurance solution provider in the Philippines, which is said to be the number one Filipino-owned stock life insurance company and Group insurance provider. The company won ‘Most Outstanding Life Insurance Company, Philippines 2021’ and ‘Most Outstanding Healthcare Provider, Philippines 2021’ titles. It is the first ISO-certified Filipino life insurance company.
To learn more about the services and solutions from the insurance organization, we spoke to Atty. Martin Loon, president and CEO of Cocolife. Following are the excerpts of the interaction –
How was Cocolife able to garner its highest income, despite the pandemic?
First, it would be the implementation of cost-saving initiatives that have lowered the overall expenses of the company’s operations. Even before the pandemic, the management explored the options of creating a work from home set up that would not only lower overhead costs but would also increase employee morale.
Second, credit must be given to the exemplary performance of employees of the company. When the management initiated the work from home set up, it ensured that the Cocolife employees were equipped with the necessary tools to be able to provide improved and efficient service from the safety of their homes. Aside from this, we emphasized employee welfare by implementing efficient systems that allowed our employees to excel while assuring that all employees would retain their positions despite the economic downfall during the pandemic.
Third, the management focused its efforts on improving customer servicing. Thus, resulting in goodwill with our clients. Cocolife has been able to cover almost a billion pesos and counting for Covid-related hospitalization and death claims. While pandemics are exceptions for coverage, I and my team believed that servicing human lives matters over profit. Moreover, the operations of Cocolife have shifted to a 24/7 around-the-clock model in order to be available to clients at any time of the day.
Describe business operations at Cocolife before the pandemic hit, during the pandemic and in this post-pandemic period.
Prior to the pandemic, the gauge of customer satisfaction was different. Our day-to-day activities would focus on ensuring the happiness of our clients. We believe that this is achieved easily when we serve customers with a smile on our faces. This changed during the pandemic because our capacity to offer ‘smiles’ and firm ‘handshakes’ were replaced by virtual communication platforms. During the pandemic, our consumers needed more flexibility with physical documents and we have addressed these gaps by adjusting our processes to accommodate virtual transactions. We saw an increase in our website payment registration and we have also implemented a virtual payment set-up.
After the severity of the pandemic decreases, Cocolife is looking at continuing the adjustments the company has made during the pandemic. We have seen the benefits and opportunities of our new systems and we’re excited to leverage the experience and proficiencies we’ve gathered during the last 2 years.
How is Cocolife incorporating the latest digitalization tools in Insurance, Healthcare, and other business lines?
With the new normal brought about by the pandemic, digitalization is rapidly becoming the standard in the insurance industry. Cocolife has embraced this shift to digitalization. We are looking towards a customer-centric strategy that will further client satisfaction and encourage others to pursue their own policies through our platform. It should be noted that prior to the official launch of our digitalized services, our company had already moved the majority of our transactions with our customers online in order to ensure the safety and welfare of our clients in the light of the pandemic.
Cocolife has already made its products and services accessible through its own online platforms. Its B2C app and website will soon be the primary tools and platforms that will provide the best possible customer experience for our clients.
We took note of the increasing trend for digital services in the country even before the pandemic hit and quickly addressed this need by creating its own app. Cocolife is only beginning to scratch the surface when it comes to digitalization as more innovations for the company in this field will continue to expand.
What are the core USPs of Cocolife in the Filipino market?
The company prides itself in offering a comprehensive suite of financial products: from traditional life, variable life, group life, health, motor, fire, accident, liability, and other insurance products to mutual fund investments—everything you will need to protect and ensure you and your loved ones’ financial security—Cocolife has it.
Please describe the unique features of your subsidiaries – Cocoplans, COCOGEN insurance, Ultra Security Services and Cocolife Asset Management.
COCOGEN Insurance offers a wide array of quality and innovative insurance solutions designed to protect everything a Filipino values, from tangible, hard-earned assets such as one’s home, business, and personal vehicle, to something as priceless as loved ones and our self. What sets COCOGEN apart is our commitment to always stand by our clients’ side. We have created new insurance products to cater to the new needs of the market. These include the ‘COVID-19 Assist+’ to help maintain peace of mind during the pandemic. Our Pro-Tech insurance helps protect our client’s main tools while working from home or learning online in this new normal. Parcel Protect is meant for deliveries during the quarantine period. Amidst the challenges brought about by the pandemic, COCOGEN strengthened its relationship with its clientele through swift issuance of policies for all the product lines as well as incorporating fast processing and evaluation of claims. We have also kept our producers in mind. Our agents were given the option to accept their commissions through fund transfers in their desired banks and we also prepared monthly training and refresher sessions for them to be better equipped in the ever-changing business landscape.
At the onset, when lockdown restrictions were put in place to quell the spread, Cocoplans was quick to pivot by the provision of online banking facilities and an online service interface to continue servicing its clients. We also have our 24-hour Family Assistance facility to meet the needs of our OPTIMAX clients, especially during the pandemic. We also recognized the fact that we have clients who do not have access to online facilities, and when lockdown restrictions were eased and our industry was allowed with limited operations, we had frontliners stationed at our Corporate Business Center to cater to the needs of our walk-in clients. We also continue to accommodate online deposits of benefit pay-outs to ensure that our plan holders are able to receive their benefits during the pandemic. All these with our goal in mind of servicing the Filipino people better.
Ultra Security Services provides a variety of security services with specializations in asset and perimeter protection. Under the guiding values of the parent company, Ultra Security Services promises to provide the best service to their clients by employing industry professionals and by providing comprehensive training to any person prior to any deployment.
Cocolife Asset Management is the investment manager and principal distributor of three Mutual Funds: United Fund, Inc. (UFI), Cocolife Fixed Income Fund, Inc. (CFIFI), and Cocolife Dollar Fund Builder, Inc. (C$FB).
United Fund Inc. is a growth-oriented mutual fund, which seeks to maximize income and maintain the liquidity of investments. It focuses on medium to long-term capital appreciation through substantial investment in blue chips and growth stocks listed on Philippine Stock Exchange.
Cocolife Fixed Income Fund, Inc. is an income-oriented mutual fund, which seeks to generate regular and steady interest income, consistent with its policy to preserve capital and to maintain liquidity of its investments through a diversified portfolio of corporate bonds, government securities, and other fixed-income institutions.
Cocolife Dollar Fund Builder, Inc. is growth and income-oriented mutual fund, which aims to provide investors with long-term capital appreciation. The fund seeks to generate long-term total returns from interest income and capital growth by investing in a diversified portfolio of US dollar-denominated fixed income and equity investments.
Enlighten us about the corporate social responsibilities undertaken by Cocolife.
In line with Cocolife’s motto of ‘Believing in the Filipino’, the company’s corporate social responsibilities have been geared towards giving back to the sectors that need it the most. We have continued our program of providing free insurance to Filipino farmers. It focused on championing humanitarian efforts by donating to various institutions such as the Tanging Yaman Foundation during the height of the pandemic.
Cocolife was among the first companies to donate to the UP National Institute of Health for the purchase of a Real Time-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) machine for Covid testing that was urgently needed in the early months of the pandemic. Cocolife provided legal assistance to non-government agencies like the Purple Center Foundation and the Tondo Community Initiative; both of which serve the urban poor and provide livelihood assistance and education to out-of-school youth and children living in dumpsites.
As a leader of the Filipino Insurance sector, we would like to know your insights about the current scenario of the industry and the potential it holds in the next 5 years.
Currently, the Insurance industry has been in a process of adjustment to rapidly meet the needs of clients since the pandemic began. Simply put, everyone is in the process of adjusting to this pandemic. The negative externalities brought by the pandemic to both the income streams and the health of the clients have caused the insurance industry to further innovate and pursue client-centric practices which we are seeing today through digitalization.
In the next 5 years, we can expect the industry to grow with the general public realizing the importance of insurance due to the impact of the pandemic. A recent study conducted by our online research panel, the COCOLIFE IDEA HUB, showed that while the majority of respondents realized the importance of insurance, purchase decisions have also been hindered due to financial constraints brought about by the pandemic.
To bridge this gap, Cocolife is aggressively developing products that address the realistic needs of Filipinos across all economic groups and are adaptive to their life stages. Cocolife recently launched its new line of protection plans: the Cocolife Protect and Protect Plus and Cocolife Term Shield, a renewable and convertible term life insurance plan. These comprehensive plans with affordable premiums are designed to provide maximum financial protection for Filipinos to feel more secure especially during these trying times.
We can also expect the emergence of ‘personalized insurance’ plans that are created and implemented through the use of advanced data analytics. Moreover, the pandemic has emphasized the importance of business continuity plans for insurance companies and the importance of continuous innovation to further client welfare and satisfaction by moving towards contactless transactions that ensure the safety of our clients.
Article by Ujal Nair
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