INSURER TO RECRUIT 1,000 NEW AGENTS

       Siam Commercial New York Life (SCNYL) is expediting the recruitment of 1,000 new agents per month during the last four months of the year is an effort to boost the first year premium growth.
       The company's agent distribution channel delivers a 4.23-per-cent growth now and the aggressive agent recruitment is aimed at raising the figure to 32 per cent by the end of this year, Donald Carden, president and chief executive officer of SCNYL, said yesterday.
       The move is to balance bancassurance and non-bancassurance business.
       The agency channel over the past seven months generated first-year premium of Bt508 million, or a 4.23 per cent year-on-year growth. The channel enjoyed a 30-per-cent growth in 2007 and 40 per cent in 2008.
       "The active rate among new agents is high at 55 per cent, therefore if we can recruit new agents, we will be able to hit the business growth target.
       "Meanwhile, we will also try to increase the active rate among 6,000 old agents to 45 per cent by providing them training courses," said Carden.
       Currently, the active agent rate of old agents is at 33 per cent, said Roongroj Kitiyanupap, executive vice president at SCNYL.
       "The agent distribution channel can generate 12 per cent of total income to the company. During the last four months of this year, we expect new agents will generate premium to the company of Bt150 million.
       "Next year the company expects to increase business growth target to 35 per cent from this channel," said Roongroj
       Between January and July thsi year, the life insurer's first-year premium jumped 25.72 per cent year-on-year to Bt5 billion. Of these, Bt4.2 billion or 32.43 per cent year-on-year growth was derived from bancassurance, which had the highest growth among other channels.
       The company has total premiums at Bt11.1 billion, up 27.53 per cent from the same period last year and well above the industry's total premium growth rate at 15 per cent.
       Market share of the company in terms of total premium then increases from 6.8 per cent at the end of 2008 to 8 per cent as of June 2009. The first year premium market share rose from 8.8 per cent to 9.4 per cent.