Promoting Financial Wellbeing
WRITTEN BY
Malvern Kandemwa
Romana Moares
iMas Finance
Promoting Financial Wellbeing iMasFinance is South Africa’s largest primary financial services co-operative, serving members working at more than 600 employer partners. Last year, the company embarked on a re-positioning and re-branding journey to better meet the needs of modern customers.
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or almost 85 years iMasFinance, established as an employee loan society within the former Iscor back in 1937, has been providing affordable and convenient financial solutions to employees at its contracted employer partners. As a co-operative, iMasFinance is founded on the principles of democracy, equality and social responsibility. Its business model promotes shared value for its members by enabling them to share in the profits of the co-operative through an annual member reward payment based on their patronage.
Banie van Vollenhoven Group CEO, iMas Finance
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Rebranding journey In October of last year, the co-operative, well known for helping South Africans with personal financial solutions conveniently at their places of work, announced that it had embarked on an exciting re-positioning and rebranding journey: the former Iemas Financial Services Co-operative Limited has since then been known as iMasFinance Co-operative Limited. The new brand epitomises the co-operative’s accelerating digital capabilities, among other initiatives, and will be implemented over the next 12 to 18 months. This involves the rebranding of all iMasFinance’s assets, including 27 national branches and its digital presence. iMasFinance’s commitment to its customers and employer affiliates is its priority and remains a key strategic focus. “With a rich legacy spanning over eight decades years, iMasFinance has been helping employers with affordable employee benefits by providing solutions that promote financial inclusion. Our business excellence model prides itself on offering solutions that are almost unmatched when it comes to affordability and personal financial services offered in the work environment,” says Banie van Vollenhoven, Group CEO at iMasFinance.
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Solutions that are almost unmatched when it comes to affordability
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He explains that the rebranding strategy reflects the co-operative’s purpose which is to both empower and protect members to live well financially, while creating shared value. “Our refreshed iMasFinance brand strives to get closer to our members through digital solutions and to fulfil their financial needs. We will also continue to empower them with financial health while creating the kind of shared-value proposition that is relevant for the African market,” he affirms.
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iMas Finance
Finance Feature Diverse offering The co-operative is synonymous with providing affordable and trusted financial products and services for employees at many corporates and organisations, across various sectors and industries. iMasFinance’s diverse offering includes vehicle finance, pension-backed home loans, debit and credit cards, educational and personal loans. Comprehensive insurance solutions are offered through its wholly-owned subsidiary Iemas Insurance Brokers – soon also to reveal a similar trading name. The iMasFinance business model works by entering into agreements with progressive companies wanting to invest in their greatest asset, their employees, by providing financial wellness solutions. In essence, iMasFinance invests in its members’ employees by offering complimentary financial wellness training as well as short-term financial advisory services, housing solutions, personal loans, payment cards and vehicle finance. At the workplace level, iMasFinance gives employees the opportunity to take up its products and gives them a share in the co-operative’s profits through its rewards programme. In terms of personal lending, the co-operative offers a number of products including iCar, iLoans, IHome, Insurance as well as financial wellbeing, i.e. financial wellness workshops and life-file training at all the companies and organisations that have agreements with iMasFinance – at no cost to the employer or employee.
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Finance Feature “Our purpose is to empower people to live well financially while creating shared value for our members. So as we have navigated the last two challenging years, it has re-ignited the passion to do what we do, as we believe that it is the reason for our existence,” says Banie van Vollenhoven. He notes that the focus over the past two years has been first on stabilising the business and then on starting to enable operations for growth while maintaining good profitability and earnings growth ahead of GDP growth. “The theme over this period has been enablement in relation to IT system development, digitisation, process improvements, support function readiness and people empowerment. Covid-19 not only forced the shift to remote work, it also forced us to engage virtually with members and employer partners, increasing the urgency to leverage IT as an enabler for our business.” Speaking about imminent tasks, he acknowledges that the co-operative has planned to shift focus to customer excellence, to improve the customer experience and increase the ease of doing business with iMasFinance. “While we have implemented many initiatives to simplify processes and improve the efficiency of customer engagement, the ongoing impact of the pandemic has meant that we have had to focus first on improving back-office execution and enablement in a virtual world, in order to facilitate the focus on customer service.” He further explains that the co-operative’s strategy prioritises four distinct battlegrounds it aims to win on while delivering on its strategic priorities: product enhancement, employer diversification, digitisation and efficiencies. “While operational expenditures were well controlled year-on-year, we exceeded our planned investment in IT in order to accelerate the digitisation journey. The goal of our process improvement initiatives is primarily to improve the customer ex-
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perience by increasing the speed and efficiency of service, although some cost benefits will be realised as these improvements compound.”
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The goal of our process improvement initiatives is primarily to improve the customer experience
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Turbulent times
iMas Finance
Customer-centric identity The purpose of embarking on a rebranding journey last year was to ensure that the co-operative remains relevant to the ever-changing needs of its members, to drive growth in new member segments and to make sure its branding continues to align with the evolving and expanding business it creates. “The initiatives implemented over the last two years have established the necessary platforms, systems and structures to return the organisation to growth, once the economic situation stabilises. Our investment in our people has improved capacity and alignment to support improved service delivery and performance. Recent trends in both the insurance and lending businesses show improved monthly volumes, although a strong rebound in financial performance is only likely once interest rates revert,” reflects Banie van Vollenhoven. He affirms that going forward, iMasFinance’s passionate, competent and innovative workforce of 550 people will continue to work hard to deliver excellent service to the co-operative’s members. “We are excited to present our new identity, which underpins and drives enhanced member value propositions and digital innovations – all focused on a customer-centric service offering.” enquiries@imasfinance.co.za www.imasfinance.co.za
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iMas Finance + www.imasfinance.co.za
info@busenq.com www.busenq.com