Insurer structured around three customer groups

Royal & SunAlliance (R&SA) has announced a further re-organisation of its UK business in a bid to improve customer service.

The changes will see the business structured around three customer groups - broker, retail and affinity.

It will also see the creation of a new operations function for all claims, retail and affinity business.

As a result two new roles will be created on the UK executive team: a chief operations officer and a managing director of affinity.

Adrian Brown, currently managing director, retail, will take the role of chief operations officer, while Julie Hopes will be promoted from her current role as claims operations director to managing director of affinity. Both appointments are with immediate effect.

The insurer's UK claims director, Rod Kitchen, will leave the operation to work for R&SA's Scandinavian unit prior to his retirement next year.

R&SA said the changes marked the next stage in the insurer's "strategic drive to become more customer focused" and build on the re-organisation of its broker division earlier this year (News, 11 May)

Bridget McIntyre, R&SA UK chief executive, said: "This is an important step in our strategic journey to become the best insurance provider in terms of customer service and expertise.

"By re-aligning our business around our three customer groups and creating an increased emphasis on delivering outstanding service through the new operations function, I believe we will drive a customer focus across all parts of the organisation."

A spokeswoman for the company said no further job cuts were expected beyond the 1,000 staff cuts announced in June.

New R&SA business structure
Retail - direct personal and small commercial business transacted under the More Th>n and More Th>n Business brands [acting managing director: Mike Holliday-Williams]

Operations - all claims, retail and affinity operations [chief operations officer: Adrian Brown]

Broker - commercial and personal business transacted via insurance brokers [managing director: Brendan McManus]

Affinity - business transacted via corporate partners or with affinity groups [managing director: Julie Hopes]

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