The fundraising started last week at NIBA’s Convention in Adelaide where Backpacks 4 SA Kids was the event’s charity partner. Founder Rachael Zaltron was interviewed on stage by NIBA’s CEO Richard Klipin about the work they do and to kick off the fundraiser.
Some insurance firms base their business model around doing just that.
On the Convention’s marketplace floor, Insurance Business spoke with Sarogini Millott (pictured left) and Graeme Berwick (pictured right) from the agency, Community Underwriting.
The agency and its 16 staff are marking their 10th anniversary this year and sell coverages through brokers around the country to not for profits.
Since the firm’s inception, Berwick said every client that pays more than $50,000 in premium automatically becomes a shareholder.
“Then we donate 70% of our surplus back to our shareholders every year,” he said.
However, in Berwick’s opinion, the small grants program is “the most important” way the agency helps out in the community.
“We put another 5% of our surplus into small grants and every year we give away between 50 and about 70 grants to smaller not for profits of one, two and $5,000,” he said. “That means a lot to those little guys.”
Berwick said by the end of this year Community Underwriting will have given away $10 million.
“So $10 million in donations makes us a little different,” he said.
Berwick said “it’s a really nice” business model.
“It resonates with brokers as well,” he said.
For example, a small grants donation, he said, provided a small pet rescue operation with enough money to buy a shade cloth to protect their animals.
With a $5,000 donation they fixed another problem.
“We replaced a disability lift up in Tasmania that was stopping people doing two hour drives to get to it because it had been broken down,” said Berwick.
He said the firm only insures charities, so a great part of the job is knowing that every client “is doing something nice” to help people or animals.
“We also employ people where we can that are in the sector already,” he said.
Berwick said he’s sat on a Meals and Wheels board for the past 18 years.
IB asked Millott, the chief underwriting officer, what the main insurance challenges are in the charity sector?
“It’s pricing it right because charities don't have a lot of money,” she said.
Another challenge, she said, is understanding exactly what the client does.
“A lot of the not for profits don't just serve a meal, for example, they might be looking for signs of dementia in the people they’re serving while also trying to come up with new ways to keep their funding coming,” said Millott. “So, it's knowing the risk, because it can be quite diversified, and then pricing it right.”
Berwick gave the example of a church.
“People might think the churches are buildings with a congregation of people but quite a lot of them get involved in work for the dole programs or food banks and other things,” he said.
He said making sure the broker understands that and then places the risk in the right way is “really important.”
Millott said a lot of information that’s useful to brokers in the sector can be found on the Australian Charities and Not for Profits Commission (ACNC) website.
“If the charity or community group is registered with the ACNC it's a useful website where you can get their financials, staff numbers, turnover and also a brief business description and other data,” she said.
Berwick said his firm also holds forums where they aim to “tease out” exactly what their clients do.
Are you a broker in the not for profits sector? What are your challenges? Please tell us below?
