Access America 2008 Annual Report Download - page 28

24 Mondial Assistance Annual Report 2008
time to carefully review our B2C web-
site and asked ourselves how we can
help you, our direct customers, better?
The answer is in our new online product
offers like cell phone insurance and
roadside assistance! 2008 was a key
partnering year with Allianz. We worked
closely with their new management team
to build a best-in-class way to manage
operations and ensure transparency
between us. In a similar vein we renewed
our commitment to the values of corpo-
rate social responsibility and launched
www.mondiality.it. This won us SA8000
certification! And we have a newcomer
to our Group - Mondial Contact Center
Italia. Here we manage contact center
services for our customers and even
ourselves!
Netherlands: innovation
in a mature market
The vehicle assistance market in the
Netherlands continued to climb in 2008.
On this wave, we strengthened our ope-
rational productivity. We continued to
focus efforts on promoting our popular
annual travel insurance products. We
also observed a shift from the travel
industry toward the insurance industry
as a distribution channel. As one of our
goals is to further help our individual
consumers, we successfully launched
a roadside assistance solution just for
them. And of course, as in other coun-
tries, we transitioned very successfully to
the new Mondial Assistance brand!
Poland: Dynamic sales
and innovative healthcare
The assistance market in Poland grew
by 30% in 2008 – and it was an excel-
lent year for our Polish business unit.
We achieved high sales growth des-
pite a more competitive environment.
We now have a 33% share of the
country’s assistance market and are
considered a domestic leader. We have
also built a strong base to foster future
growth. How? By improving our core
business and successfully launching
new domestic products targeting the
mass market. Our innovative healthcare
products and additional concierge servi-
ces have also been very successful.
Reunion Island: A diversifi ed
client portfolio
We sustained over 5% growth in our
Reunion Island business unit in 2008.
CRM services remain the main line
of business; that being said, the
assistance activity is picking up vigo-
rously. It combines emergency hotline
solutions with services and claims
handling (i.e. car fleets, insurance
claims and real estate management…).
In response to this growth, we recently
launched several innovative solutions for
our customers. Our client portfolio has
grown as well and now includes several
public sector entities.
Russia & CIS: a bold beginning
for travel insurance and
roadside assistance
On March 1st, 2008 we kicked off our
new Russian activities and had a very
promising first year. Our 24/7 assistance
platform, which also covers medical
requests, helped many people and
handled over 5,000 files in 10 months!
We’re also pleased to announce that our
Russian team is now complete. Our core
activities in this vast market are travel
insurance and roadside assistance. So
far we have built a roadside assistance
network in 80 Russian cities and we’re
actively developing our core offer for the
CIS (Commonwealth of Independent
States) and Bulgaria. We’re currently
in close contact with insurance com-
panies in the Ukraine, Kazakhstan and
Armenia.
Spain: Quality improvements
and a bright “green” attitude
With 68% female staff, our Spanish
business unit increased sales by 14.3%
in 2008, mostly from the tourism indus-
try. But who was the real star? A product
line for travel agencies whose revenues
climbed by 30%! We created a new
computer-assistance service, which
works by phone, email or chats, and
offers a remote access option as well.
2008 was a very “green” year for us in
Spain. We extended a caring hand to the
environment and reduced our consump-
tion of paper and paper products by
50%! We also launched a hefty roadside
assistance program in Madrid with 3 tow
trucks – this should let us handle more
than 6,500 cases in our capital a year.
And because you are always on the top
of our mind, we set out to improve the
quality of our roadside assistance ser-
vices and our ability to design specific
customized solutions for you. How, you
might ask? Through Neoasistencia,
a subsidiary company that focuses
exclusively on these challenges.
Switzerland: new distribution
channels key for future growth
We enjoyed another successful year in
our Swiss business unit. Revenues grew
by 17.3% and we increased our share in
all key markets! We worked in a sound
economic environment into Q3, which
led to a higher loss ratio as people tra-
veled more and paid more to do so. This
trend reversed in Q4. Overall our profit
grew in line with revenues and our com-
bined ratio reached an excellent 94%.
A major change for us in 2008 was the
distribution landscape. For the first time,
a major retail chain is now selling our tra-
vel insurance and roadside assistance
products. Car dealers are also offering
travel insurance at the time of a new
car purchase. These new distribution
International presence