OUR STRATEGY AND APPROACH

Sanlam and AfroCentric strategically intensified their efforts to identify synergies and foster collaboration. This includes enhancing client experiences through a comprehensive product value proposition encompassing health, wealth, and insurance protection. A novel holistic corporate wellness model was implemented, forging partnerships with client schemes and leveraging Sanlam Corporate services. The focus remained on achieving growth and retention in client scheme membership and the Sanlam Gap Cover and Primary Health Insurance books. These initiatives strengthened the alliance between Sanlam and AfroCentric, delivering enhanced value to clients and fostering sustainable growth.

• Leveraged Sanlam’s best practices in technology and data, accelerating AfroCentric’s digital and managed care transformation
• Continued focusing on unlocking synergies through collaboration, driving significant value. The corporate solutions cluster is set to play a crucial role in product integration and growth, showing a 27.9% increase in Sanlam Gap policies. However, despite exceptional growth, this business faced challenges as one of the leading new channels, the Sanlam Umbrella Fund, did not gain the expected traction during the year

Our client-facing strategy sought to enhance the customer journey across various aspects of our business. This included optimising our sales approach, refining our service delivery model, ensuring exceptional care during critical moments, showcasing the value we offer, driving product development and innovation, and fostering customer loyalty. Specifically, we prioritised the retention of our customers by consistently delivering exceptional experiences and value. In this way, we sought to establish long-lasting relationships and solidify our position as a trusted healthcare provider.

• Gained significant traction in digital solutions and enablement capabilities, ensuring optimal product delivery with a focus on easy benefit access, self-service, and high-touch service
• Our subsidiary, Medscheme, won the Diamond Arrow Award for its outstanding contribution to Disease Management – Asthma, Hospital Utilisation Management and Counselling of High Claimers at the PMR Africa Awards. Medscheme also won the Golden Arrow Awards across multiple categories, including Alternative Fee Structure/Reimbursement, Chronic Medication Management, Disease Management – Cardiovascular, Health Risk Assessment, Management of Specialists and GPs and Wellness Programme

Primary health insurance provides coverage for essential healthcare services and preventative care. It is crucial in promoting early detection, managing chronic conditions, and maintaining overall wellbeing. It aims to make healthcare services affordable and accessible, ensuring prompt medical care, preventative check-ups, and essential treatments. This leads to improved health outcomes and a higher quality of life, aligning with our Group purpose. By leveraging the synergy between primary health insurance and medical schemes, members can enjoy comprehensive and cost-effective healthcare solutions. Specifically, medical scheme members on lower options (Hospital Plan), when combined with gap cover and primary health insurance for day-to-day benefits, will get richer benefits at a lower total cost.

• The corporate solutions cluster saw a 25.1% rise in primary health insurance policies
• The Group acquired the remaining 49% of Essential Group, the licence holder for the primary insurance business, in anticipation of increased demand for low-income products as medical scheme affordability becomes more challenging

Our people are a critical differentiator. We are devoted to helping them self-develop. A top priority was fostering a high-performance culture to help us achieve our strategic goals. Our vigorous and persuasive People Plan fed into our overall business strategy and powered it.