Insurer FBD has reported a net profit before tax for the first half of the year of over €18 million. That compares to a figure of just below €12 million for the same period last year.
Gross written premium - a key performance measure - came in at €192 million, €2 million higher than the first half of 2017.
Fiona Muldoon, Group Chief Executive of FBD, said the team had delivered a very strong set of results. "This is an excellent underwriting profit for us, and we're very pleased with it."
She said there was a major winter storm, Storm Emma, in March and FBD had paid out over €11 million in claims, which is included in the results.
Ms Muldoon is currently facing an internal investigation at FBD. She wouldn't be drawn on the nature of the allegations against her. "You'll understand that that's an independent process and it is currently ongoing so we are working to bring it to a conclusion. At this time, there's not really much I can add to that."
Insurance firms are often accused of imposing excessive premiums. The FBD CEO said the main cost of an insurance premium is injury costs and legal costs. "Bodily injury claims are by far the biggest costs in any insurance company," she said.
The Government produced a report 18 months ago, with 73 recommendations on how to address the high cost of insurance. Ms Muldoon said she would like to see 3 or 4 key recommendations effected. "We are waiting on the personal injuries commission report and I believe when that report issues, it will show that awards are much higher in Ireland for bodily injury, particularly for minor soft injury claims such as whip lash are much higher in Ireland than they are anywhere else in Europe."
She said the average whiplash injury in the UK is around £4,000 and that compares to almost €20,000 in Ireland. "I think the important thing is we have some choices to make around whether we want to see very high payouts in courts on these kinds of awards or whether we want to see low insurance premiums. I don't think you can have both."
There have been calls for a single European market for insurance and other services, that would help increase competition, and possibly lower prices for customers. Ms Muldoon said the Irish market is already very competitive. "There is a common regulatory regime in Europe and everybody has the same rules under that regime so I don't think that the issue is competition. I think it's much more about the level of awards and the level of payouts that are made in this jurisdiction."
FBD is traditionally associated with rural Ireland, having been established by farmers for farmers 50 years ago, but the company has recently opened a branch on Baggot Street in Dublin. She said farmers are still very much a core part of everything that FBD is doing, but the firm does have a very big SME book of business in the capital as well.
"Our model is different in that we have direct relationships with our customers. 95% of business is written directly with our customers, not through brokers or any other intermediary so having a branch in Dublin made sense for us," she said. "We have one in Drumcondra and one in Baggot Street since last week, and that makes sense to us to be right there on the ground with the SMEs; the businesses, shops, pubs, all of which we are insuring in Dublin. That's a very important market for us. It's a market where we think that those SMEs are underserved and we can deliver a quality service and grow. That's why we opened on Baggot Street."
