Local financial product providers vie for industry accolades
Financial services stakeholders are bracing for one of the largest events on the local calendar… Later tonight guests will descend on the Sandton Convention Centre to find out which brands scoop the coveted FIA 2011 Awards. There are nine awards on offer at the Financial Intermediaries Association (FIA) gala banquet which takes place from 19h00, 9 June 2011! Tonight’s award ceremony will be the fourth under the FIA banner and promises to upstage the 2008 and 2009 events, with close to 1,000 RSVPs received. Why all the fuss?
The short answer is that winning an award at this gala function is the ultimate accolade for financial product providers! The selection process is based on feedback from thousands of financial services professionals who conduct their trade at the proverbial coalface of the domestic financial services industry. The guys using the products get to decide the award winners! We’re talking about the financial intermediary – the typical FAnews Online subscriber – and the person who spends every day of their careers living the ‘treating customers fairly’ principle the regulators so desperately want to introduce!
An intensive selection process
The FIA 2011 Awards recognize the contributions made by South Africa’s top product providers in the employee benefits, healthcare, insurance and investment space, with a particular focus on the needs and requirements of financial services intermediaries. Bluestream Marketing and Research carefully considered the perceptions, views, expectations, awareness levels and opinions of thousands of FIA members before deciding the category winners. The company has been involved with the Awards Survey over the past six years and has gained valuable insight into the intermediary and insurer value chain in the process.
Pieter Aucamp, MD of Bluestream, has put in countless hours to ensure the selection process if ‘free’ and ‘fair’. “Classical research methodology is used every year to gather the information via a telephonic survey, whereby a total of 6,087 Insurance Contracts were rated by FIA members phoned at random,” says Aucamp. These results were gathered through 2,710 in-depth telephonic interviews across the length and breadth of South Africa. “We enjoyed willing participation from the majority of FIA intermediary members who gave us their undivided attention for rating their product suppliers,” he says. Interviewees were asked to rate product providers in their different product categories based on product quality, service quality, relationship quality and overall satisfaction.
Categories contested in the FIA 2011 Awards include:
· Short-Term Insurer of the Year – Personal Lines
· Short-Term Insurer of the Year – Commercial Lines
· Short-Term Insurer of the Year – Corporate
· Underwriting Manager of the Year
· Long-Term Insurer of the Year – Risk Product
· Investment Product Supplier of the Year – Retail Investments
· Long-Term Insurer of the Year – Recurring Savings
· Employee Benefits Product supplier of the Year
· Health Care Product Supplier of the Year
Check the results on FAnews Online tomorrow
FAnews Online will be among the FIA guests enjoying the awards ceremony this evening. And we’ll make sure our readers have a first hand account of the event. We’ll be sending out a special newsletter on Friday, 10 June 2011, to update you on the winners in each of the FIA 2011 Awards categories. The information will also be posted on our website, https://www.fanews.co.za/
