This year, Sovereign was rated first in 60% of the 50 categories surveyed and first or second in 84% of the categories.The company rated first in six of the eight categories ranked as most important by advisers themselves.
“It’s extremely encouraging to see that we continue to be ranked number one in the critical area of claims action, as well as speed of underwriting, policy administration, product range and call centre responsiveness,” Sovereign managing director Simon Blair says.
He says this year’s results show an upward trend by life insurers who are increasingly achieving upper-quartile service and satisfaction ratings.
“It’s a good sign when the healthy competition that exists is also driving measurable improvements in service standards and adviser satisfaction. Advisers are certainly getting the benefit of the focus Sovereign and other insurers have invested in raising the service bar. It’s good for both the industry and policyholders,” Blair says.
“While it would be much easier to concentrate on a few speciality areas, it’s clearly those insurers, like Sovereign, with consistent delivery at high levels across all areas of their business, that have made the difference to how satisfied advisers feel with their product providers.”
Results from the study also suggest that despite distractions and uncertainties surrounding the financial services sector, advisers responded confidently about the current health of the industry.
In particular, proposed regulatory change appears to have had little impact on influencing how advisers feel about their own succession plans. Only 20% of advisers are indicating they will leave the industry over the next five years, the same number seen in the previous two years.
Around one third of the 740 advisers surveyed, also had plans to introduce a new adviser within the next 12 months, a percentage which has remained reasonably stable for the past few years.
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