What are the challenges ahead for SBI Life?
We aim to strengthen the bancassurance model through the branches of State Bank of India and other associate banks we have tie-ups with. Currently, SBI Life products are being sold in over 6,500 branches of the State Bank Group – around 1,500 branches are selling individual policies and another 5,000 group products. Bancassurance is the company’s key distribution channel, contributing over 43 per cent to the total premium o, at Rs 470 crore for the financial year ended March 31, 2006. This year we hope to increase that to 50 per cent. What is the strategy to increase the contribution of bancassurance to 50 per cent? We have to increase the penetration in each of the branches. For instance, if a branch has 5,000 customers, currently we would have tapped about 80-100 customers. The idea is to increase this to 1,000 to 1,500 customers. Towards this end, we are working on an intranet model along with SBI to provide on-line sales support to the bank staff. At the touch of a button, `bancass
