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As the blasts of the ubiquitous vuvuzelas and shouts of Ke-nako died down, marking the end of a fantastic Soccer World Cup tournament, we looked back at the financial year that was. The past year has been punctuated by the highs and lows of the global economic rodeo. The bulls and bears did battle whilst being cheered on by speculators and yet despite this, we managed once again to produce a solid set of financial and non-financial results showing an overall gross premium growth of 19%. We have kept an eye on both our financial and non-financial objectives and ensured that we maintained a steady course ahead.
The economic stresses did place strain on our policy retention and new business strategies and yet despite this we managed to grow our client base by a credible 20%. We accomplished this by rising above these challenges and again articulating the quality of our products and providing innovative insurance solutions to new and existing clients. The unpredictable nature of the economy required dynamic and innovative solutions. Our credit life product that we launched in 2008 is providing new and existing clients with a great solution to protect themselves and their assets in these uncertain times. Our short-term insurance products are designed to cater for all segments of the socio-economic scale.
Our OUTbonus payouts reached the R800 million mark in March 2010, a mere nine years since the first OUTbonuses were paid out. We are looking forward to the R1 billion mark.
Our total claims supplier base has doubled and the strategies implemented to increase the socioeconomic development benefit related to our procurement practice has resulted in a 169% increase of our BBBEE supplier base. This is a manifestation of our commitment to increase our supplier footprint across South Africa.
We have continued with our commitment to Corporate Social Investment with a further R10.7 million injection into the OUTsurance Pointsmen project. As a result of this initiative we received an award for outstanding contribution to socio-economic development at the BEE Institute's annual conference in October 2009. We are committed to expanding this project to all major cities in South Africa. Our Helping Hands initiative has benefitted a host of needy institutions. One of our more successful community projects this year has been the Nkufumeto Winter Drive. We collected more than 15 000 cans of food which was then distributed to various needy beneficiaries.
Our staff complement increased by 19% to accommodate the growth of the company. Plans are underway to open several more satellite assessment offices throughout the country, thus giving assessors easier access to our clients. These should be opened early in the new financial year. We are eagerly anticipating the launch of OUTsurance Life in August 2010. Through this we will provide clients with quality underwritten life products. It will be a great addition to our product range and will add value to the insurance portfolios of our clients. Our company-wide performance incentives remain a great retention tool and awesome production driver.
We have made significant headway with regard to our carbon-footprint determination. Our footprint is relatively low, given our size and type of business. We are able to monitor our footprint and, with the assistance of FirstRand Group, this monitoring will assist our efforts to lower our environmental impact where possible. We completed our tree-planting project in February 2010. The tree planting project compliments our staff recognition programme in that a tree is planted in recognition of every employee who has completed 10 years service with OUTsurance.
We maintain our commitment to rooting out syndicated and individual criminal elements within the insurance industry and society at large. Our affiliation with the South African Insurance Crime Bureau (SAICB) and the input we have given and received has, suffice to say, borne fruit.
Our subsidiary company in Australia, Youi, has expanded its operations to include all territories in Australia. During the year under review they have managed to notch up a few notable accolades including winning the award for best strategic marketing launch and best on-line insurance service in Australia.
Back at home in South Africa, OUTsurance scooped the Sunday Times Award for being the Top South African Brand in the short-term insurance category. This is the fifth time in six years that we have walked away with this prestigious title. In February 2010, and for the second time in three years, OUTsurance was awarded first place in the Short-Term Insurance Ombudsman's esteemed Isabel Jones Ukusizana Award at a presentation in Johannesburg. The Ombudsman introduced this award in 2007 to recognise the efforts of short-term insurance companies who – in the true spirit of "ukusizana" ("working hand in hand") – show outstanding commitment to efficiency, service excellence, as well as fairness in claims and complaints resolution. OUTsurance also won the South African leg of the Ernst & Young Best Entrepreneur competition. These accolades are a great achievement for OUTsurance as a company and for our stakeholders who have placed their trust in us.
We are proud of everything we have achieved in the last year and for maintaining our image as a successful short-term insurer in South Africa. We accomplished this through practices that ensure the sustainable growth of our client base; continued fostering of profitable relationships with our business partners and service providers; increasing the reach of our Corporate Social Investment initiatives; maintaining our status as a great company to work for and participating in exercises that seek to reduce our carbon footprint. We are looking forward to what the new year will offer in terms of challenges and opportunities and we endeavour to continue thinking out of the box, looking to capitalise on the opportunities, provide solutions to the challenges and make sure that as an OUTsurance stakeholder you will always get something OUT!
Willem Roos
CEO, FirstRand STI Holdings