Introduction
As we come to the end of the year, it is often a good time to reflect.
It presents an opportunity to look back at the challenges we’ve had, the lessons learned and also the achievements and successes, no matter how small that have happened along the way.
In quarter 4’s E-zine, we take the time to do just this.
I’d also like to welcome Brendan Lee (our new Business Development Manager in Ireland) and Tim Garner (our new International Business Development Manager for Global Risk Solution). You can read more about Brendan and Tim below.
I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank you all sincerely for your continued support of Utmost Corporate Solutions, we greatly appreciate it.
Finally, I want to wish you a very Merry Christmas and continued success in the New Year.
Ken.
Head of Relationship Management and Strategy
“MOVING FORWARD WITH GLOBAL MOBILITY” WEBINARS: In January and February 2022, Utmost Corporate Solutions presented at a series of webinars organised by international broker network, Brokers Link and Generali Employee Benefits. Over 200 international brokers attended the webinars. UCS’s Global Risk Solution product is ideally placed to provide group risk cover for multinational corporations with employees in multiple jurisdictions.
CIPD JERSEY AWARDS 2022: Virginia Alcoba Segura, Client Relationship & Business Development Manager and Susan Echebima, Client Services Manager, both from the Guernsey office, attended the CIPD Jersey Gala Awards 2022 that took place in the Royal Yacht hotel in Jersey on Saturday 18th June. The awards were created to honour and recognise the outstanding achievements by those who are passionate about people management and development. Local business professionals were invited to enter the awards and have their personal and organisation’s achievements recognised and celebrated. Utmost Corporate Solutions had the honour of sponsoring the award category for “Outstanding Employee Engagement Initiative during the Covid-19 pandemic”, which was won by the Jersey Employment Trust (JET).
IEBA (INTERNATIONAL EMPLOYEE BENEFITS ASSOCIATION 20TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE): This conference took place from the 7th – 9th June in Brussels. The event offers a wide programme covering the dos and don’ts, best practices and trends in international employee benefits. It was a great opportunity to get the latest insights, along with new approaches and inspiration. Up to 200 delegates involved in international employee benefits attended, including people from human resources, risk management and finance functions, as well as their advisers and industry service suppliers. Brendan Lee (Business Development Manager – Ireland) and Ken Mortimer, (Head of Relationship Management and Strategy) attended with some of our Generali Employee Benefits (GEB) colleagues. IEBA boasts a large membership of 700 scattered across 30 countries.
MOSAICO PODCAST: Our very own Michelle Leahy (Head of Utmost Corporate Solutions) took part in the September episode of GEBs popular podcast that brings together various insurance partners of GEB. The focus of the podcast is to communicate to listeners, the latest news, trends, and innovations taking place in the Employee Benefits world. You can listen to Michelle’s interview here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mosaico/id1609039784
HIGHLIGHTING UCS CLAIMS PAID IN 2021: At Utmost Corporate Solutions, the global pandemic changed the way we work but it did not impact our focus of delivering the utmost care and commitment to our clients. In fact, the pandemic highlighted our teams care in supporting every single individual client along their journey with us and treating them with empathy, respect and care. Even with our claims assessors working remotely, we settled more claims in 2021 than ever before.
BRENDAN LEE APPOINTED AS THE NEW BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER FOR IRELAND: Brendan joined Utmost in November 2017 where he worked in the marketing department promoting Utmost’s wealth solutions before moving to Utmost Corporate Solutions in 2019. In this time, Brendan has become an integral part of the commercial team bringing with him many years of brokerage experience having previously worked for FBD’s retail broker arm as their Sales and Marketing Manager. Brendan is a QFA and has an MSc in leadership & management practice. Brendan joined the sales team in September 2022. Brendan has already been in-touch with many of our brokers and clients.
GENERALI EMPLOYEE BENEFITS (GEB) TALKS: Michelle Leahy (Head of Utmost Corporate Solutions) was invited to take part in a virtual discussion on “Risk” with the GEB Talks Team. Other subjects in the series included: Global Mobility, Captive Solutions, Health and Wellbeing, Sustainability, Pension and Risk. These virtual events gathered experts and specialists from the Employee Benefits community and was well attended.
CLAIMS VANTAGE: Kevin Nolan and his claims team have recently implemented software called Majesco ClaimVantage, effectively modernising and optimising our claims operations. Implementation will provide Utmost clients with a competitive edge through enhanced claims experience and improved timely data and insights. Designed to process all our benefits provision on one software platform, this claimant-centric solution drives accurate and timely claim decisions across the full claims’ life cycle from intake through payment for Group Life, Income Protection, Critical Illness, Accident and more.
We are integrating it with our policy administration system to ensure prompt calculation of benefits and storing of payment history.
MENTAL HEALTH AND WELLBEING HUB: In recognition of World Mental Health Day on the 10th October 2022, Utmost Corporate Solutions ran a HOW’s UR HEAD? (HUH) campaign to launch our Mental Health and Wellbeing hub. This is an ancillary service that provides a range of digital mental health tools focused on illness prevention and wellbeing optimisation for employers and their employees. Within the hub, you will find a range of videos, topic flyers and discussion guides on:
Content is provided from a range of in-house and external industry experts. You can read about it here
UK HEATH AND PROTECTION AWARDS 2022: On the evening of October 12th, members of the USC team attended the UK Health and Protection Awards at the London Hilton on Park Lane. The event is the UK’s pre-eminent celebration of excellence in professional standards and innovation shown by intermediaries and providers to individuals and corporate customers across the disciplines of private medical insurance, wellbeing and financial protection. UCS hosted a table of 10 people made up of friends, colleagues and business partners in the health and protection community.
WE WELCOME TIM GARNER – THE NEW INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER FOR GLOBAL RISK SOLUTIONS:
In October, we were pleased to announce the appointment of Tim Garner as Business Development Manager for the Group Risk Proposition -‘Global Risk Solution’. Tim brings a wealth of International experience from his many years with Cigna Global; working with clients and brokers to meet the needs of expat populations across the world.
A real advocate for the client, Tim continuously champions the voice of the consumer through cultivating long-term strategic partnerships to develop and deliver real world solutions that maximise engagement and results.
Tim is very articulate and pragmatic with a strong background in commercial sales. He has extensive knowledge of the international insurance industry from a strategic account management and business development perspective.
CLAIMS MADE EASIER: In recent research, Irish brokers told us that our claim form was too long and could be improved. In response to this, we created a new and improved version of the group life claim form by:
- Reducing content – the claim form has gone from 12 pages to 3 pages,
- Improving the signposting for completion – new and improved layout with clearer instructions make it easy to fill in; and
- Eliminating unnecessary jargon – to purge existing points of confusion.
The changes were very well received by the Irish market and have prompted a further review of literature and forms as we move into 2023. You can access the new updated form here: https://www.utmostwealthdocs.com/mb/CgGAQ7
CIPD IRELAND WELLBEING SEMINAR: As part of focus on Mental Health and Wellbeing, Utmost Corporate Solutions (UCS) sponsored the closing keynote speaker Professor James Lucey (Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) and Consultant Psychiatrist at St. Patrick’s University Hospital) on November 24th. The seminar focused on educating companies on how best to integrate wellness into the workplace culture and sharing skills to enhance employee wellbeing. UCS was represented by Brendan Lee. CIPD Ireland has a membership of over 8,000 HR professionals.
ALL UTMOST CORPORATE SOLUTIONS PLANS NOW ON ONE PLATFORM: This year, UCS undertook a complex project to migrate all of our Irish book of business onto the same administration platform as our international business.
From 2023, all UCS business will be administered from the same platform creating internal efficiencies in terms of turn-around-times and Management Information. The platform also brings with it a digital capability and a number of new online resources which we will begin to roll out throughout 2023.
OFFICE OPENING HOURS FOR THE FESTIVE SEASON
