About two months after some policy holders in AIICO Insurance Plc blew the whistle over alleged fraudulent activities on their accounts with the company, some of the customers have begun to praise the management of AIICO for its intervention.
Some of the affected customers told our correspondent that they had been refunded by AIICO. The Point had on March 17, 2017, reported that some customers of the insurance firm accused some officials of the company of not remitting their premium to their accounts with the company as they allegedly sent fake alerts to their mobile phones.
The customers, who spoke with The Point in separate interviews, had said that they subscribed and paid premium for educational and retirement products to the firm through its official, Mr. Bode Aladesanmi, with the hope of collecting their fund with interest, five years later.
At the expiration of the tenor, efforts to reach Aladesanmi, who collected cash from them, were abortive as he stopped picking their calls and surprisingly, switched off his telephone lines.
One of the AIICO’s policy holders, Pastor Shola Lawal, praised the follow-up strategies adopted by the company “and its determination to ensure I was refunded”, which, according to him, is worthy of emulation by other companies.
“Different staff members of the company called me to cross-check information and give me update, at least, three times every week. I was asked to forward every transaction detail with the agent and proof of payment, which I did. After series of cross-examinations, they apologised and I got an alert from the company notifying me of my balance with the company, which correlate with my original balance,” he recalled.
Another customer, Mrs. Olapade Adeyemi, who subscribed to AIICO’s annuity plan, told The Point that though she had not been able to reach Aladesanmi since she blew the whistle but that her complaints had been appropriately treated and her account credited.
She said, “I am impressed with the aggressive approach of the management to tackle the allegation of fraud against one of its agents. While I expect the company to conduct proper routine background check of its agents to avoid recurrence, I think the company has zero tolerance for fraudulent activities.” Managing Director, AIICO Insurance, Mr. Edwin Igbiti, told The Point that the agent was still on the run as the men of the Nigeria Police were on his trail.
He said, “We have reported the case to the police and they have declared him missing. We understand that a bad egg can tarnish the integrity of the whole industry but we don’t want that to happen because at the end of the day, we build on trust and trust is fundamental. For the fact that one out of our 3,800 agents is bad does not mean everybody is the same.”
According to him, the agency model that AIICO runs is a tied one, which means that they are tied and duty bound by their contract to sell and represent AIICO Insurance alone. He assured that the firm had put a lot of quality control measures in place to curb excesses, adding that the stringent selection procedure of engaging sales’ executives would make it difficult for cheats to penetrate.
“We found that the agent collected money from policy holders, which is wrong. It is clearly written on all our documents that potential and existing clients should not pay for policies through any agent, staff or representatives. When you pay cash to them, it is equal to you going to the bank, seeing someone in front of the bank with its ID card and paying him without collecting teller. We don’t encourage that. We always ask our clients to make the deposits themselves, either in the bank, online transfer or at our branches,” he added.
