Hedging Risks

Responsible business practices

In our business, the environment we work in is becoming ever more complex and new risks are arising all the time. Digitalisation changes customer’s expectations and at the same time opens up new ways to approach them. We also face the challenges posed by climate change which already have a tangible impact on our business.

ERGO is ready to meet the challenges of this changing landscape. Our customers and their needs are at the centre of all we do. We will continue to expand our range of products and services that are easily available via digital channels. In addition to our insurance solutions and products taking into account environmental protection, we also provide customers with investment options related to sustainability for their wealth management.

Our customers

Forward-thinking solutions

Our investments

Clarity and innovation for the best solutions

At the heart of all we do - Our customers

Our customers’ needs and requirements govern all we do as a business. We demonstrate our customer orientation with clear communication, easy-to-understand and easily accessible products, a wide range of opportunities for customers to give us their feedback, and top-quality customer advice.

Clear communication: comprehensible contract documents

We use clear language to ensure our customers know exactly what we are offering them, and give them descriptive and comprehensible information rather than losing ourselves in complex specialist terms. We adhere to clear-language criteria certified by external experts, and substantially revised our contract documents and product information. External auditors accompanied this process over several years and regularly reviewed the comprehensibility of our customer communication.

nexible: Fully digital insurance processing

Customers can not only conclude contracts online with our purely digital insurer nexible, but also handle claims settlement entirely online.

Feedback counts: Customer Workshop

We engage our customers in dialogue, and they reward us with their feedback and new ideas. Customers who join the ERGO Customer Workshop have the opportunity to support and shape ERGO with their constructive criticism and their suggestions. Customers can also submit their feedback online at any time – we’re always open to suggestions and keen to improve our service.

Voice intelligence: taking out insurance via a voice dialog

For the convenient completion of insurance policies, ERGO also relies on voice intelligence. For example, customers can purchase travel health insurance entirely through a voice dialogue.

Focus on environmental protection, technology and customer needs

Forward-thinking solutions

For ERGO, sustainability is also reflected in insurance solutions. When we develop new products, doing justice to changing customer needs and protecting the environment come high up on our priority list, as well as accompanying new technological developments.

Woman looking into the distance through a window

ESG criteria: an integral part of product development

The consideration of ethical, social and governance aspects – in short: ESG aspects - is firmly incorporated in our product development process. We also live up to our corporate responsibility with our responsible underwriting policy. In particular, we want to contribute to mitigating the impact of climate change and support the transition to renewable energies with our products. Our Group consequently took the decision to not insure any new coal-fired power plants or coal mines.

Supporting the energy transition and climate protection

ERGO provides a broad spectrum of insurance products and services which take environmental issues into account. Other insurance solutions address social challenges. For example, microinsurance products, modelled on the microcredit principle, are becoming ever more popular in developing and emerging nations such as India. They help to secure livelihoods, e.g. following earthquakes or floods.

In focus

Sustainable and innovative insurance solution

Microinsurance
Insurance with environmental features

Microinsurance in India

Microinsurance has come a long way in recent years, helping to improve the lives of many millions of people around the world. Our India-based joint venture HDFC ERGO, which has been developing and selling insurance products for rural contexts since 2008, offers a diverse range of microinsurance solutions such as health, accident, fire insurance or specific cover for livestock and equipment essential to people’s livelihoods.

Access to insurance in emerging markets such as India

ERGO uses special solutions to contribute to building up insurance markets in developing countries and emerging economies with the focus on long-term growth perspectives. One example of such a market is India, where the overwhelming majority of the population has no access to traditional insurance products. Our German-Indian joint-venture company HDFC ERGO develops microinsurance policies in close cooperation with non-governmental organisations and microfinance institutes. The key factor for the products is that they must have a transparent structure, need to be marketed at an affordable rate, and can be sold through innovative sales channels.

Diversity in microinsurance

The policies range from health insurance, through accident and property cover, to protection against the loss of working animals, and failed harvests.

Innovation in weather insurance for crop failures

On behalf of the Indian government, HDFC ERGO was the first private insurance company to launch a weather insurance policy for failed harvests on the market in 2010. The structure of this product is simple and a flat-rate payment is made to reduce the financial risks of failed harvests if a specified temperature or level of precipitation is exceeded or not achieved.

Insurance policies with environmental features

ERGO supports ecology-minded customers by extending its care for the environment into its product range. Our portfolio ranges from insurance cover for renewable energies and eco-rates for car insurance to unit-linked annuity insurance which also take environmental issues into account if desired.

The finite nature of fossil fuels and ever stricter environmental and climate protection standards have given renewable energies a role of key significance in today’s world. ERGO is supplying its expertise to help support technological developments in this field, providing the insurance cover which is vital to the use of these forward-looking sources of energy.

Environmental protection and scarce resources demand a new way of thinking about our traditional energy supply. We support the establishment of renewable energy sources using customised insurance solutions.

Thomas Meyer, Head of Technical Insurance Operations, ERGO

Insurance solutions for a sustainable energy supply

Renewable energies and relevant technologies have steadily gained in importance during the past years - not only in the eyes of consumers, but for companies as well. Corporate customers in Germany can purchase our combined property and business interruption insurance providing extensive cover for photovoltaic systems. Our homeowners’ insurance covers claims under the insured perils – for example fire or storm – to photovoltaic, solar and heat-pump systems used for private purposes.

Protection for photovoltaic systems with reduced yield insurance

The photovoltaics market is an area of particular focus for us. ERGO is one of the few insurers to offer an innovative form of extended cover for reduced yields, which covers losses incurred when the energy produced by the system in a year falls short of expectations due to causes such as low levels of solar radiation or faults with components in the system.

Protecting ecological systems

European environmental legislation increasingly requires polluters of flora and fauna, bodies of water or soil to take responsibility for their actions. In case of damage, high reconstruction costs could pose an existential threat for customer’s business. In Germany, ERGO helps customers meet this risk by offering liability cover for environmental damage. Since 2009, cover for environmental damage has become a fixed part of our corporate liability insurance policies.

Handling capital with care

Our investments

Sustainability criteria also apply to investments made for the ERGO Group. We take account of our responsibility by prudent and far-sighted investment management supported by a sophisticated controlling system.

Investment guidelines drawn up by our parent company Munich Re and the Principles for Responsible Investments (PRI) which we signed up to in 2006, provide the framework for our sustainable investment strategy across the Group.

The primary objective of our investment management is to be in a position to meet our commitments to customers at all times. The following objective applies to all lines of business: maximum security for the investors. The investment strategies are based on the differing insurance benefits. For example, in a traditional life insurance the guaranteed benefits must be generated alongside the bonus, whereas health insurance demands the ability to pay ongoing costs and making provision to pay for any higher health benefits as customers get older. We therefore need to ensure in all lines that the maturities for our investments match the terms for our commitments.

As a global investor, we are conscious of our responsibility to act sustainably and therefore integrate ESG criteria into our investment policy. Munich Re has set itself the goal of moving its portfolio towards a net-zero climate target by the year 2050. In that context, we have committed to divesting from thermal coal by 2040. Already today, we no longer invest in companies that generate more than 30 percent of their earnings from thermal coal mining or power generation from coal.

The Responsible Investment Guideline provides the framework for our investment management. It also sets out which topic areas cannot be considered for direct investment. These include, amongst other things, in-vestments in producers of controversial weapons (such as anti-personnel mines or cluster munition), as well as trading in or investments in food-related commodities (such as grain, oil seeds or dairy products). To combat human rights violations, we also exclude from our direct investments states and companies that are guilty of serious violations.

To ensure that investments are selected systematically based on ESG criteria, we rely, amongst other things, on data from leading providers of sustainability analyses and ratings. The bulk of the Group’s investments are managed by the Group’s asset manager MEAG.

Values add value

Corporate Governance

ERGO Group is unconditionally committed to responsible corporate governance. We meet the standards laid down by law as well as own corporate regulations, and adhere to stringent ethical principles.

Find jobs at ERGO

Responsible business practices

At the heart of all we do - Our customers

Forward-thinking solutions

Sustainable and innovative insurance solution

Microinsurance in India

Our investments

Maximum security for customers

Managing commitments strategically

Corporate Governance