This month, Dial Direct will add a Business Insurance offering to its portfolio. Answering to the demand for affordable, short-term insurance products for SMEs, Dial Direct Business Insurance not only caters for SME-specific insurance needs but, can also be further customised to individual business requirements.
“According to the Department of Trade and Industry, there are approximately 2 million small businesses in South Africa. Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) account for over half of South Africa’s national economic output and yet, despite the size of the flourishing SME market, there are very few short-term insurers offering products that are tailored to the specific insurance needs of smaller businesses.
“A hair-dressing salon in a small town hardly has the same insurance needs as a large mining conglomerate in the city but many insurers are still putting them into the same category,” says Anthea Abrahams, director of Dial Direct Insurance, adding that SMEs, which are the lifeblood of small towns, can be crippled financially if they are not insured.
Abrahams says that Dial Direct’s move to offer tailored business insurance for SMEs is in line with the escalating trend in Europe of direct insurers developing products specifically for small businesses.
“In the United Kingdom, in particular, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of direct, web-based insurance providers targeting smaller commercial customers. Some insurers who are already established in private motor, household and other personal insurances have gone as far as to separate, branded small business-oriented sites offering a range of tailored products, packages and services,” says Abrahams.
She points out that small business-owners are becoming increasingly open to alternative purchasing routes, saying that the findings of a recent survey of SMEs in the UK showed that they are less reliant on face-to-face contact for advice and value the ease and convenience of evaluating insurance options and completing policy applications over the phone or on the internet, usually outside normal office hours.
“We know that SMEs in South Africa experience the same time pressures as their UK counterparts and therefore expect them to follow this trend.,” says Abrahams.
She explains that Dial Direct’s Business Insurance offering is divided into four segments namely Business, Office, Practice and Professional. Each segment has a specially-tailored product that provides cover relevant to the needs of the businesses that fall within that category.
"Each product contains the correct combination of traditional policy sections to ensure that a small or medium business is adequately looked after from an insurance point of view. This means that there are no superfluous clauses, which in turn means that there are no unnecessary premium costs. Most importantly, though, clients still have the flexibility to include additional cover for their specific business needs,” concludes Abrahams.
Dial Direct Insurance offers short-term insurance direct to the consumer, with super-low premiums, super rewards and super service.