Hibernian chief plans to cure ailing pension profits

Tony O'Riordan, managing director of Hibernian Life & Pensions, is not quite as ecstatic as you might expect in a week in which the Hibernian Group announced sparkling results.

While group operating profits were up 34 per cent to €281.8 million, this was thanks largely to the performance of its general insurance division. It was not such a bumper year at Hibernian Life & Pensions, where operating profits actually fell 29 per cent to €57.4 million.

The results are "a bit of a mixed bag", admits O'Riordan, who stepped into the managing director role at the life and pensions wing in December, following a three-year stint as group finance director.

The good news was that new business sales last year increased by 9 per cent, meaning Hibernian Life & Pensions hung onto its number three position in the market (an 11 per cent share).

But heavy competition drove protection premiums down, while earlier than expected cash-ins on investments dented profits.

O'Riordan identifies his challenge for 2005 as turning the trend around.

"We have got to make sure that we get those results back to where they need to be. In 2004, they were not as good as they needed to be.

"We need to focus on keeping business on the books and making sure that the customer experience is a good one."

An actuary by profession, O'Riordan plans to review the quality of the product behind the figures on the balance sheet.

Customer loyalty can, disappointingly, no longer be assumed.

"I think that the customer is much more promiscuous than they were 10 years ago or even five years ago. Now people are looking for the best quote and brand isn't particularly important to them."

At the same time, there is widespread inertia, O'Riordan notes.

Often, people's choice of one-stop-shop for financial services is determined by their parents' choice of bank.

Another Irish tradition, "this love of property" as O'Riordan phrases it, detracts money away from pensions, which account for almost 75 per cent of Hibernian Life & Pensions' business.

The company, in common with the rest of the industry, would naturally benefit if boring, sensible old pensions were to become more popular a concept among the relatively young Irish workforce.

As a result, it is joining the clamour of banks, insurance companies, industry bodies and consultants who are all desperately lobbying the Government to incentivise the reinvestment of Special Savings Incentive Accounts (SSIAs) into a pension.

"It would make a lot of sense for the Government to waive the exit tax and provide an incentive for people to continue the savings habit," he says, adding that defusing the pensions time bomb is in everybody's long-term interest.

New research commissioned by Hibernian shows that savers have not been suffering under the strain of siphoning off money into an SSIA - 84 per cent said saving each month was not a burden.

The survey of 1,200 adults by Behaviour & Attitudes found that almost half had earmarked their SSIA windfalls for home improvements, new cars or once-in-a-lifetime holidays. Only 2 per cent said they would consider using it to save for retirement.

The survey also indicated that lower income workers - the Government's target pension group - are least likely to reinvest their SSIA funds or to use them to start a pension.

Compulsory pensions, due to be examined in a Pensions Board report later this year, will be politically difficult to introduce, O'Riordan believes.

"Even in countries where the clock is ticking more loudly, such as France and Italy, they haven't had the political will to do anything about it."

The Government's last big attempt to fill the pensions gap, introducing the low-charge Personal Retirement Savings Accounts (PRSAs), has not been especially successful.

"Probably the biggest sellers are the banks," he says.

Distributing its wares mostly through the broker network, Hibernian has found it more difficult and less attractive to pursue the market.

Independent financial advice needs to be paid for, O'Riordan stresses, and Hibernian plans to make a submission to the financial regulator's current review on remuneration in the industry.

The status quo, whereby most brokers receive commission from product providers rather than charge customers fees, leads to the accusation that brokers are not always as independent as they claim. But the system works, he says.

"As far as we are concerned and as far as brokers are concerned, it is a good way to do business and a good way of giving value to customers."

Life has been busy for O'Riordan since he took up the top job at Hibernian Life & Pensions. Over the last three months, he has endured an appendix removal and enjoyed the birth of his second son.

Further change is on the cards, with the Hibernian Group examining a move to Burlington Road in Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.

Such a move would see around 500 Life & Pensions employees relocate from Dawson Street and try to chase customers from a new, leafier base.