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HDFC Ergo General Insurance remains optimistic about growth prospects for the general insurance sector and believes that improvement has already been evident in the third quarter of the fiscal.
“If one looks at only the third quarter data, then motor premiums have increased, private car registrations, two-wheeler registrations are back. So, next year, all the pent-up demand will come back and we will see a good year for the industry. And ,of course, we will be riding the good economic growth,” said Anurag Rastogi, President, Chief Actuary and Chief Underwriting Officer, HDFC Ergo General Insurance.
In an interaction with BusinessLine , Rastogi noted that the Covid -19 pandemic has turned health insurance into a pull product.
“As offices open up and people come to normalcy and start moving around, we see demand picking up. Look at the third quarter separately and retail health insurance has grown by 30 per cent,” he said, adding that this is fairly healthy growth.
“January, February and March is the peak period when health insurance is sold and this quarter will give some idea as to what we should expect from the coming year,” he further said.
Non-life insurers reported a 6.7 per cent growth in January this year to ₹ 18,488 crore compared to ₹17,333.7 crore in the year ago period.
Rastogi also said insurance companies are well prepared to deal with any possible second wave of Covid cases in the country.
“Insurance companies can never relax. We are prepared for whatever happens and will continue to honour our commitments to our customers,” he said.
When asked about the merger of HDFC Ergo Health Insurance (formerly known as Apollo Munich Health Insurance) with HDFC General Insurance, Rastogi said it will help scale up operations and improve delivery of products and services to customers.
“It is a union of two good institutions coming together. It brings together the knowledge of health insurance of HDFC Ergo Health Insurance, which was a wonderful institution with good products, systems and the financial strength of HDFC Ergo General Insurance,” he said.
The two had announced the completion of the merger in November 2020.
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