South African consumers are becoming increasingly critical of the short-term insurance industry, says Consulta, commenting on the findings from the latest South African Customer Satisfaction Index (SAcsi) for the sector.

According to the group’s latest survey findings, customer loyalty among insurers is on the decline and companies are struggling to articulate their customer value proposition and differentiate across all the cross-functionalities of their service offerings.

Most customers are incredibly sensitive to service delivery, quality, value, and price, Consulta said, and very few players, if any, have emerged in a better position in this regard after two years of the pandemic.

“The (short-term insurance) industry collectively has some serious challenges ahead to meet in changing customer perceptions of value and quality, and meeting increasingly higher customer expectations,” the group said.

The latest SAcsi for Short-term Insurance (2021) shows an industry where competition between players is fierce, and where only two insurers emerged on an industry par score for overall Customer Satisfaction, with all others performing below par in the Customer Satisfaction stakes.

There is no leader in Overall Customer Satisfaction across all participating insurers.

While the index differentiates between direct and intermediated insurance models, it is also important to note that all short-term insurers compete for the same customers regardless of their distribution models. The 2021 SAcsi for short term insurance polled just over 3,600 customers of short-term insurers during the second half of 2021 across the following brands:

• Intermediated insurers: Absa, Auto & General, Momentum, Nedbank, Old Mutual Insure and Standard Bank.
• Direct Insurers: Virseker.

Virseker (82.5) and Momentum (81.5) are the only two insurers on industry par (81.2) in the overall Customer Satisfaction measure. No leader emerged. All other insurers are below industry par.

Virseker showed a marginal improvement compared with 2020, while Momentum has shown consistent improvement over the last three indexes, from a score of 77.8 in 2019, Consulta said.

Absa (77.3), Old Mutual Insure (77.1), Auto & General (74.8), Standard Bank (74.7) and Nedbank (67.9) are all below par and show a decline in previous 2020 scores, with the exception of Absa which enters the SAcsi for the first time in 2021.