MLC wins Risk Company of the Year
MLC secured the win over last year's winner, BT Financial Group (BTFG), and TAL.
NAB general manager for business management, Melissa Heyhoe, attributed the win to the firm putting the customer at the centre of everything they do.
"We have taken our already comprehensive insurance solutions to a new level this year with the removal of policy fees for new customers and functionality to support premium payment by rollovers from any superannuation account," Heyhoe said.
"We are also committed to innovation but finding new and better ways to meet the needs of our customer.
"We're also making an investment of at least $300 million to modernise and simplify our super, investments and advice offering — to deliver better products and services for our advisers and our clients."
Heyhoe said MLC's commitment to making insurance accessible and as flexible as possible was the firm's greatest strength.
"In particular, our family protection offer is compelling — with features like Child Cover and the Best Doctors service. The Best Doctors service connects policy holders, their children, their parents and parents-in-law to a global network of peer-nominated leading medical specialists at no additional cost to the policy holder," she said.
Heyhoe said MLC's greatest achievement this year was bringing MLC's health and wellness program, MLC On Track, to market as it is Australia's first smartwatch technology program in the life insurance market.
Coming in second was last year's winner, BT Financial Group, with its head of life insurance, Phil Hay attributing their success to its employees.
"I have the privilege to work with some of the most amazing people who are incredibly committed," he said.
"We've been focusing on putting the customer in the heart of everything we do. It's about looking at what is going on in their life, and really about treating each claim and customer as a holistic person. It's not just about writing a cheque, it's about how they gain a quality of life.
"But in essence it's down to a higher purpose and it's believing in the product and services, and all around compassion and delivering on a promise."
Hay said BTFG would be looking to innovate and add value to every step of the business.
"We're especially looking at working with advisers to work out how to improve transparency and productivity," he said.
Sustainability of its offering has been the backbone of TAL's success over the last 12 months, the insurer's general manager for individual life, Gavin Teichner, believes.
"Advisers really like the fact that it's well priced and gives good value, but at the same time, they also appreciate that it is a sustainable product suite," he said.
"So in a couple of areas we haven't added all the bells and whistles on to certain products to ensure the product remains sustainable and pricing remains affordable for customers."
Teichner added that TAL had adopted a policy of trying to keep their products simple.
"In the market, some of our competitors have taken the approach of introducing quite a lot of significant loyalty programs and other add-ons to their product features for consumers," he said.
"We've taken the view of keeping our products a little more pure — simple to understand, and that's something we've got strong feedback on, that's resonated with advisers."
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