34. Dial Direct Insurance Marketing

Fee and commission income (2000): £16.5m
Pre-tax profit (2000): £53,000

Address:
Dial Direct House
165 Corporation Street
Coventry
CV1 1GY
Tel: 024 7649 5631
Fax: 024 7629 3271
Email: marketing@bennetts.co.uk ; marketing@ddirect.co.uk
Website: bennetts.co.uk ; www.ddirect.co.uk

History: Dial Direct Insurance Marketing was founded in 1994 as a joint venture between NIG Skandia and Michael Bennett, managing director of G F Bennett & Company, a specialist motorcycle insurance intermediaries.

Based in Coventry, Dial Direct shares the same location with Bennetts, which was established in 1930 by the grandfather of Michael Bennett.

Launched initially to support car insurance underwritten by NIG Skandia, Dial Direct has developed to provide generic products for car, motorcycle and home, each supported by a panel of leading insurers.
Following the merger of the two businesses in 1999, Bennets has become a trading style of Dial Direct Insurance Marketing.

Since its launch, the Dial Direct group has completed a number of acquisitions, including
the Redditch-based call centre operation of
0700 2 Insure, which was acquired last year.

Now with two direct call centres and branch locations in Coventry and Hillingdon, the group offers commercial lines, affinity partnership arrangements and online quoting.

Chief officer: Michael Bennett
Biography: Michael Bennett, 52, joined the small family brokerage of GF Bennett & Company in 1970, following three years of general insurance grounding with Guardian Royal Exchange. A chartered insurance practitioner, he developed
the business from a local broker to a national intermediary, specialising in motorcycle insurance.

Michael was appointed as Bennetts' managing director in 1985.
In 1994, Michael founded Dial Direct as a joint venture with NIG Skandia and went on to merge that business with Bennetts in 1999. He continues his role of managing director at Dial Direct and has overall responsibility for NIG's intermediary operating companies.

Major shareholders: National Insurance, Intermediary Group, Michael G Bennett.
Main lines of business/Special schemes: Motorcycle, private car, household.

Number of UK branches: 4
Number of employees (average for 2000): 629

Greatest technological advance: E-commerce. Last year, Bennetts became the first motorcycle insurance specialist to offer online quotes through to purchase.

Having created the consumer website, Bennetts used its format for a dealer website that provides the same instant quotation facility for motorcycle dealers. This constituted an additional sales tool for dealers, allowing a purchaser to assess their insurance costs before buying a bike.

To encourage traffic, Bennetts developed kiosks to take the site out to the public and potential customers. Kiosks have been used at exhibitions and are now being sited in large motorcycle dealerships.