Day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Tower Limited's Full-Year Result Announcement Call 2025. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there'll be a question and answer session. To ask your question during the session, you need to press star one one on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to our speaker today, Michael Stiassny, Chairman of Tower. Please go ahead.
Good morning, and thank you for making the time to join us for this call and presentation of our 2025 Full-Year Results. With me in Auckland is our Chief Executive Officer, Paul Johnston, and Interim Chief Financial Officer, Angus Shelton, who will take you through the results and answer your questions. I think we can all agree that it's been a great year for Tower shareholders. FY 2025 record underlying result demonstrates a strong business delivering value today whilst continuing to build for tomorrow. This year, we returned NZD 45 million of capital to shareholders, and I'm pleased to announce that we have declared a fully imputed final dividend of NZD 16.5 per share. Combined with our interim dividend, this brings total dividends for the year to NZD 24.5 per share. In considering this dividend, the board wanted to distribute the benefit from lower large event costs to shareholders.
The NZD 16.5 per share dividend is made up of NZD 7.5 per share from adjusted earnings, excluding large events, and an additional NZD 0.9 per share, reflecting the underutilization of the NZD 50 million large events allowance in FY 2025. These decisions underscore our commitment to consistently deliver returns backed by sustainable profit growth and a robust capital insolvency position. Whilst we celebrate these achievements, we are also mindful of the future. The unusually kind weather conditions and the absence of significant natural hazard events have undoubtedly contributed to our success both this year and last. However, we know such conditions are not permanent. That is why we will continue to focus on what we control: investing in our digital platform, maintaining rigorous underwriting discipline, product innovation, and leveraging technology, data, and efficiency to drive performance.
Our goal is clear: to build a business that is not only resilient but also deeply customer-focused, ensuring we are well prepared for whatever lies ahead. We were the first insurer in New Zealand to announce the introduction of address-level risk-based pricing. Risk-based pricing enables lower pricing for low-risk customers while effectively managing exposure. We have maintained disciplined execution of our strategy, strengthened by strategic partnerships with the likes of Trade Me, Kiwibank, and from mid-next year Westpac , and brand momentum with a new campaign that will help drive future growth. At the same time, we're investing in innovation, technology, and AI to position Tower for its next growth phase. These investments will enhance efficiency, deliver better customer experiences, ensuring Tower remains competitive and relevant in a rapidly changing market.
Before I hand over to Paul, I'd like to add a few additional words about Tower's risk-based pricing strategy and approach to public advocacy and sharing hazard information with customers. We see this as a competitive advantage for Tower and that it's increasingly driving real-world action. As an example, the South Dunedin Futures Project is an excellent model of community-led adaptation planning. The project actively sought to incorporate insurance considerations, including from Tower, into its planning processes, which in my view should be applauded. I was not surprised to read the results of a recent nationwide survey by CNZ that found 67% of respondents knew that natural hazards impacted their insurance premiums, and almost 25% felt they did not have access to clear information about those hazards when owning or buying a property.
This tallies with our own research, which found that 86% of people surveyed consider it important to have information about their property's risk profile. Whilst the national adaption framework aims to provide a way forward, by the time the details, by the time we work out who pays, are hashed out for the average homeowner or buyer, it could be too little or too late. They need certainty, and they want access to information now. The reality is there is a lot of data that is already available at a cost, and most insurers are using it when they price risk. The Tower difference, and this is what I believe we should be very proud of, is that we have chosen to make our insurance assessments of earthquake, flood, sea surge, and landslide risks visible and accessible. For us, it's the right thing to do.
Our experience aligns with the recent statements by Kris Faafoi of the ICNZ Chief Executive that global reinsurers have made it clear that climate adaption in New Zealand is not optional. Our view remains that risk-based pricing provides the strongest, clearest indication of where adaption measures are critical. That is why we have also shared our insights and demonstrated our hazard model to both local councils and central governments to contribute meaningfully to the national climate adaption conversation. Ultimately, I would like to see a New Zealand-wide database created that becomes the single source of truth and is accessible by everyone. A centralized authoritative data source that truly understand the perils our country faces at both a granular and regional level. It would be a most powerful tool to really drive and focus climate adaption action.
If used to guide smarter land use decisions and resilient infrastructure investment, it could help maintain cost-effective reinsurance and therefore long-term insurance accessibility in New Zealand. Most importantly, it would empower people and communities to make informed choices about where they live and how they build their family's futures. Food for thought. Back to today, FY 2025 has been an exceptional year. We remain focused on building a business that is sustainable and resilient through the cycle and one that continues to deliver attractive returns for shareholders. I'll now hand over to Paul and Angus, who will take you through the results and outlook before we open for questions.
Kia ora and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for our 2025 Full-Year Results. Here is an overview of our presentation today, which will include the details of our record FY 2025 underlying result and its key drivers. We will also provide an update on our strategic plan and the next phase of Tower's growth, which I'll begin with now. FY 2024 and FY 2025 were all about continuing to build stronger foundations under Horizon 1 of our strategic plan. During this phase, we focused on resilience and efficiency to position Tower for sustainable growth. We strengthened our core by building foundational strength, managing risk exposure carefully, driving operational efficiencies, and investing in technology to improve processes and customer experience. At the same time, we worked hard to create an effective and distinctive culture that empowers our people and supports long-term success.
These efforts, which I'll talk about in more detail shortly, have created a solid platform for the next stage of our strategy. We are now entering Horizon 2, where the focus shifts to innovation and transformation to accelerate growth. Tower has seen strong operational and business performance in the year. Gross written premium increased to NZD 600 million, and customer numbers grew strongly to 318,000. We also saw a substantial reduction in the BAU claims ratio, while the management expense ratio remained stable and large events costs were low. These factors combined have led to a record underlying profit after tax of NZD 107.2 million. Reported profit for FY 2025 is NZD 83.7 million. On the basis of these results, Tower will pay a fully imputed final dividend of NZD 16.5 per share, bringing full-year dividends to NZD 24.5 per share.
This compares to NZD 9.5 cents per share last year in addition to the NZD 45 million capital return. FY 2025 was an exceptional year for Tower, driven by favorable external conditions and the disciplined execution of our strategy. While the conditions provided a strong tailwind, we expect these to normalize in FY 2026. Large event claims costs were just NZD 7.2 million, significantly below the historical 10-year average. This benign weather environment also supported improvements in our BAU claims ratio and overall profitability. We delivered strong policy growth; however, the soft rating cycle, lower inflation, and reduced claims from a lower-risk portfolio led to a decline in average premiums. As shown in the chart on the right, effective average premiums fell sharply over the year as we moved quickly to adjust pricing to attract and retain quality risks in what remains a highly competitive market.
This is welcome relief for customers after the premium increases driven by COVID-related supply chain challenges and the 2023 weather events. Inflation has also come back, returning to historical averages. This contributed to improvements in our claims performance. Motor theft frequency has reverted to pre-COVID levels following actions taken in prior years to reduce exposure to high theft vehicles, helping to lower claims frequency and severity in the motor portfolio. Finally, reductions in the official cash rate have reduced investment income. These conditions, combined with our transformation initiatives, created a unique environment for FY 2025. This chart provides context to Tower's performance over a five-year cycle in which we've delivered consistent and sustainable improvements in underlying profitability driven by disciplined execution and strategic investment. When we remove the costs of large events from underlying impact, the underlying trend is clear.
Profitability has strengthened year after year, reflecting the impact of improvements we've made to the business. Profit has also been helped by more recent benign BAU claims experience in the last two years. Our FY 2026 guidance for underlying net profit after tax of between NZD 87 million and NZD 97 million, excluding large events, assumes the current soft rating cycle continues and the BAU claims ratio begins to return to more normal levels. Despite a soft rating cycle and intense competition, Tower achieved strong policy growth in FY 2025. We welcomed 13,000 new customers, bringing our total to 318,000 and delivered 6% policy growth in New Zealand core products, with strong 11% growth in house policies. This performance reflects our strategic focus on the house portfolio. House insurance customers typically hold more policies and stay longer, so prioritizing this segment strengthens both retention and profitability. Importantly, growth has come with improved risk quality.
Our risk-based pricing strategy means we're growing in lower-risk customers. As a result, Tower's expected average annual loss from flooding has reduced by 21% on a per-policy basis and 16% overall, a significant improvement in portfolio resilience. We also strengthen our brand presence. Our new campaign, The Misses, launched during the year and resonated strongly with Kiwi audiences, winning Kantar's June 2025 Ad Impact Award. Looking at the graphs, you can see the shift in risk count over the past five years. House policies have grown consistently with a sharp increase in FY 2025, while the motor portfolio has now returned to growth after a drop in FY 2024 following actions to tighten risk appetite in late FY 2023. This reflects our deliberate strategy to focus on high-quality risks and build a stronger, more resilient portfolio.
In FY 2025, we leveraged the benefits of increased scale by investing in strategic initiatives designed to deliver long-term value for Tower and our customers. These initiatives focus on driving greater efficiency, enhancing customer experience, and supporting sustainable growth. This includes the launch of Amazon Connect, improving customer interactions, and service delivery. We also introduced an integrated motor assessing system, which is cutting assessment times, reducing manual effort on claims handling and lowering repair costs. Our digitization program is nearing completion, with 79% of tasks now able to be completed online, making it easier and more efficient for customers to manage policies and lodge claims. We expanded risk-based pricing to include two new perils and started work on building our AI capability. These steps position us for greater efficiency and innovation in FY 2026 and FY 2027.
Our innovative approach was recognized with the Insurance Business Five Star Insurance Innovator Award for the second year running in 2025. Delivering simple and rewarding experiences for our customers remains a core priority, and in FY 2025, we made strong progress. Our net promoter score rose to +44, up from +38 in FY 2024, reflecting the impact of our digitization program and operational improvements. We also improved telephony performance, with sales and service abandonment rates dropping to an average of 7%, down 1% year- on- year, as we streamlined processes and expanded digital capability. Digital adoption overall continues to improve. In New Zealand, 63% of sales, 51% of service tasks, and 70% of claims lodgments are now completed online. At the same time, 59% of customers are registered for MyTower, up from 53% last year, showing strong engagement with our digital platform.
Our SuvaHub continues to deliver efficiency benefits, now handling 83% of New Zealand sales and service calls, compared to 55% in FY 2024. This scale improvement is helping us deliver faster, more consistent service. Finally, we were proud to be recognized as the Insurance Sector Award Winner at the 2025 CRM Contact Center Awards New Zealand, reinforcing our customer focus. I will now hand you over to our Interim Chief Financial Officer, Angus Shelton, who will talk you through the details of our financial performance for this year.
Thank you, Paul, and good morning, everyone. Gross written premium grew by 2% compared to FY 2024, driven by strong policy volumes. This growth was tempered by lower average premiums as Tower prioritized attracting low-risk customers and maintaining competitive pricing. The BAU claims ratio improved significantly to 41.3%, driven by a range of factors, including targeted rate increases from the prior year flowing through the portfolio, improved risk selection, reduced motor theft, and relatively benign weather conditions throughout the year. Large event costs for the full year were NZD 7.2 million. The MER remained stable at 31% as we reinvested improvements from increased scale into technology and growth initiatives. We are reporting an underlying impact, including large events, of NZD 1 07.2 million, a strong uplift from the prior year, and a reported profit after tax of NZD 83.7 million, up from NZD 74.3 million in FY 2024.
Reported profit includes strengthening of provisions for Canterbury earthquake claims, customer mediation costs, and some software impairment. Here is the bridge between underlying impact in FY 2024 of NZD 83.5 million and underlying impact of NZD 1 07.2 million in FY2025. You can see that business growth, driven by higher net insurance revenue, contributed NZD 9.5 million. BAU claims improvements due to prior year rating and fewer than expected claims due to weather and lower motor frequency added a further NZD 25.1 million. Partly offsetting these gains were the movement in large event costs year- on- year and NZD 4.1 million after tax of increased strategic investments aimed at delivering future growth and efficiency. Overall, these factors have driven a strong uplift in underlying impact year- on- year. Despite strong volume growth, the software rating environment impacted GWP growth, which was 2% year on year.
Within this, House GWP grew strongly at 10%, driven by an 11% increase in policies, reflecting our strategic focus on the house portfolio. On the other hand, motor GWP declined by 5%. While motor policies grew by 2%, we reduced premium rates to balance margin and growth in a competitive market. Our partnerships channel delivered 12% GWP growth, and overall New Zealand retention improved to 78%, up from 77% in FY 2024. On the right, you can see the growth in total GWP over time, which has increased steadily from NZD 404 million in FY 2021 to NZD 600 million in FY 2025. In FY 2025, we saw a significant improvement in claims performance, with the BAU claims ratio reducing to 41.3%, down from 48.1% in FY 2024. This improvement reflects prior year premium growth earning through and a flattening of both severity and frequency trends.
As shown in the graphs, motor claims frequency eased to 11.8% and severity moderated to NZD 3,156 per claim, following prior actions to reduce exposure to high theft motor policies. Efficiency initiatives, such as reducing reliance on external assessors, also helped contain costs. House claims frequency increased to 7.4%, driven by more small weather-related claims, while severity remained stable at NZD 3,954 per claim, supported by a less inflationary environment and improved risk selection. Finally, large event costs for the year were NZD 7.2 million, reflecting the relatively benign weather conditions. We can see that the management expense ratio remained at 31.4% in FY 2025, consistent with FY 2024. While we saw improved efficiencies of scale from business growth, which contributed a 2.1% reduction in MER, this was offset by increased investment in strategic and foundational initiatives to improve growth, efficiency, and resilience, which added 1.1%.
There was also a 0.7% increase from timing differences related to deferred acquisition costs and a further 0.3% increase from staff and other costs. These cost increases are largely linked to inflation and growth initiatives, but importantly, they remain below the rate of inflation thanks to efficiencies from digitization and the Suva Hub. In FY 2025, net investment income was NZD 19.2 million, which is NZD 2.4 million lower than FY 2024. Tower continues to maintain a conservative investment strategy focused on high credit quality and liquidity, with a target duration of around six months for the core investment portfolio. This approach has helped mitigate volatility from macroeconomic factors and mark-to-market movements while allowing us to benefit from higher interest rates earlier in the cycle.
However, as you can see on the left, the running yield on the core portfolio has declined steadily, finishing the year at 3.1%, down from its peak of over 6% in early FY 2024. With interest rates now well past their peak, we expect yields to remain suppressed and continue to trend lower in line with OCR movements. The two key non-underlying items which impacted reported profit in FY 2025 were Canterbury earthquake provisions and customer remediation costs, starting with the Canterbury earthquakes. We continue to settle claims with 25 claims closed during the year, but we also received 22 new overcap or reopened claims from the NHC, which is seven more than FY 2024. This higher-than-expected inflow resulted in the total number of open claims only falling slightly from 30 September 2024 to 13 at 30 September 2025.
Because these new claims came in at a higher rate than we've seen recently, and with average costs trending above historical levels, we strengthened our outstanding claims provision to allow for the possibility of more new or reopened claims in the future. As a result, FY 2025 includes an adverse Canterbury earthquake charge of NZD 7.9 million after tax recorded as a non-underlying item. We continue to work closely with the NHC to identify potential overcap claims earlier and with our specialist team to finalize outstanding Canterbury claims as efficiently as possible. On customer remediation's, we incurred a NZD 10.9 million after-tax charge, which includes further provision for remediating customers and the costs associated with delivering the remediation programs. Investigating and resolving historical errors remains complex and resource-intensive, often requiring as much investment in analysis and confirmation as the remediation payments themselves.
That's why we're investing in systems and processes to ensure we get it right for the future. In FY 2026, Tower has successfully renewed its reinsurance program, securing comprehensive cover at competitive rates. The program includes catastrophe reinsurance of up to NZD 915 million for two events, an increase from NZD 800 million in FY 2025 to meet the requirements of our growing house portfolio, and continued cover for a third event of up to NZD 85 million. The retention for catastrophe events has increased slightly to NZD 20 million, following the expiry of multi-year arrangements. We've also made a structural change for large individual property risks, moving from proportional cover to excessive loss, which reduces reinsurance premiums while maintaining strong protection for large claims. As a result of these changes, reinsurance premium expense is expected to reduce to an estimated 11.3% of GWP in FY 2026, down from 13.4% in FY 2025.
This reduction will be partly offset by lower recoveries on property risks previously ceded under proportional treaties. We've also deepened partnerships with global reinsurers, with several committing to new multi-year agreements, providing greater certainty around future costs and catastrophe excesses. For FY 2026, we have set a large event allowance of NZD 45 million, down from NZD 50 million in FY 2025, which reflects our improved risk selection. The storms across New Zealand in late October 2025 will be recorded as a larger event in FY 2026, with an estimated cost of NZD 4.5 million. Tower's capital and solvency position remains strong, supported by prudent capital management and a reaffirmed A-minus financial strength rating by AM Best in April 2025. During the year, we transitioned to the Second Amendment to the Reserve Bank's interim solvency standard, and our solvency ratio is now 143%.
The change from last year includes the NZD 45 million capital return to shareholders, profit and regulatory capital movements, and the FY 2025 dividends. Adjusted solvency margin as at 30 September 2025 is NZD 89 million, which is net of the final dividend of NZD 16.5 per share. Tower continues to maintain a strong capital position and the financial flexibilities to support growth while continuing to meet regulatory requirements. Thank you. I will now hand back to Paul, who will provide an update on our guidance and near-term priorities.
Thank you, Angus. We are now moving into the next phase of our strategic plan, one centered on innovation and transforming our offerings. Horizon 2 , spanning FY 2026 and FY 2027, is focused on sustainable growth and delivering a leading customer experience, supported by investment in customer data, digitization, and innovation. We will embed AI where it adds value and efficiency while carefully managing risks.
As always, we remain committed to consistently improving earnings while leveraging the efficiencies and resilience we've built in Horizon 1. Looking further ahead to FY 2028 to FY 2030, our ambition is to broaden growth through new channels and innovative products, moving from being a market challenger to a market leader. This means continuing to build a leading brand, driving a highly automated and digital business model, and delivering personalized customer experiences at scale. I'll take you through some of the specific initiatives that will drive this transformation in the following slides. We're targeting more than NZD 750 million in GWP by FY 2028 through organic growth, and in FY 2025, we delivered a number of initiatives to get us there. A major milestone is our new partnership with Westpac New Zealand starting July 2026. This partnership will expand our reach and support our future growth.
We will also be offering insurance to a portfolio of Kiwibank customers currently insured by Ando during the next 18 months. On the brand side, we've launched a bold new campaign, The Misses. This campaign reinforces Tower's position as a modern, digital-first insurer and builds emotional connection with customers. We've also implemented sea surge and landslide risk-based pricing, which we expect to help attract new customers and improve retention through lower pricing. Finally, removing the multi-policy discount will help simplify our policy sales and management processes. Tower remains committed to providing fair, transparent, and competitive pricing, and we will continue to review our pricing to deliver value to customers. Innovation is central to our strategy for delivering a simpler, smarter, and more rewarding customer experience while driving efficiency across the business. By FY2 028, we're targeting 80% of sales, service, and claims lodgment tasks to be completed through digital channels.
This shift will make interactions faster and easier for customers while reducing cost and complexity for Tower. Our investments in digitization will be key to achieving this goal. We plan to build a customer data platform that lays the foundation for our vision of hyper-personalized service, a future where we can surface relevant insights about each customer to suggest products, services, and benefits tailored to their unique needs and situation. This will help customers get the best cover and value for their circumstances. Alongside this, we plan to roll out AI-driven process automation to streamline workflows and transform claims management with a new house assessing platform. Our partnership with Amazon Connect will help deliver best-in-class enhancements to our contact center. Finally, we'll invest in product innovation to meet emerging customer needs, particularly in the context of climate change.
Looking ahead to FY 2026, we are targeting gross written premium growth of between 5% and 10%, with a management expense ratio expected to remain between 31% and 32%. This will deliver underlying impact, excluding large events, of between NZD 87 million and NZD 97 million. Our FY 2026 large events allowance is NZD 45 million. We are targeting a combined operating ratio of between 86% and 88%, supporting strong underlying profitability. Assuming full utilization of the large events allowance, underlying impact is expected to be between NZD 55 million and NZD 65 million, with any unused portion of the large events allowance flowing through to improve the full year result. Reported impact will be impacted by non-underlying items related to remediation's and costs associated with regulatory change. Looking further ahead, we've disclosed medium-term targets for FY 2028.
As the insurance cycle stabilizes and strategic initiatives deliver, we expect GWP to reach NZD 750 million or more, representing a cumulative annual growth rate over the next three years of over 7.5%. We also expect the management expense ratio to improve to between 28% and 30%, and a combined operating ratio target of between 85% and 87%. These targets reflect our confidence in the strategy and the strong foundations we have built, positioning Tower for sustainable growth and long-term value creation.
Thank you for your time this morning. I'll now hand back to the operator to ask for questions.
Thank you. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Please stand by as we compile the Q&A roster.
First question comes from Kieran Carling from Craigs Investment Partners. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. Great result. Well done. First question from me is just on your guidance for FY 2026. You know, fair to say we've seen a fair bit of pressure on rates through FY 2025, which, you know, now appear to be stabilizing. But can you talk us through your key assumptions for FY 2026 when it comes to the rate environment and then the expected contribution from the Kiwibank bankbook and also the new Westpac partnership?
Yeah, thank you, Keiran. As you've mentioned, rates have gone down this year. We're expecting those to start to normalize into next year, moving from a position where they were decreasing to flattening out.
We have some confidence in our ability to continue growing our portfolio, particularly of house customers, and we will benefit from the Westpac partnership in the last quarter of the year. Also, as you mentioned, we are referring a bankbook of Kiwibank customers currently insured by another insurer over to us in that last quarter as well. We are looking for that growth target next year to come mainly from policy growth rather than without contribution from rate.
Great, thank you. Just to elaborate on that, are you able to quantify, you know, what GWP growth you're expected to get from that Westpac partnership? If I understand correctly, you're not getting access to the bankbook, you know, from IAG. Can you just help break down what contribution you're expecting?
You're correct. We're not planning to get any revenue from the bankbook.
It is just for sales of new business from 1st of July, and I'm not in a position to comment on the GWP.
Okay, but yeah, fair to say that you're not expecting any real rate growth at all in FY 2026?
That's correct. The growth in FY 2026 will come from volume, not from rate.
Okay, thank you. Next question is just on the management expense ratio. You were previously targeting, you know, below 26% in FY 2027, and then back in May that shifted to below 28%, and now we're seeing guidance for FY 2028 at 28% to 30%. I appreciate that you've, you know, seen some staff cost inflation. There's some strategic investments being made, but what's driven that latest increase? I guess, is it fair to assume that the management expense ratio, you know, will stabilize around that 28% to 30% in the medium to long term?
Yes, we're definitely still targeting 28% to 30% in the medium to long term. On the journey there, we've put in guidance of 31% to 32% for FY 2026. There's very little impact from inflation within that number, although obviously there is some from salary costs and the nature of that. Largely, that increase reflects us investing in growth. That is both the various initiatives that we've discussed in relation to our technology investments, particularly our contact center and our claims transformation as well. There's also growth associated with those new partnerships that we've announced, particularly the Westpac partnership, and we're investing more spend in brand and marketing with our new brand campaign. We're increasing the spend year on year in marketing costs.
Okay, but just in relation to the last targets you released, which was, you know, below 28% in FY 2027, what's changed since May when that target was released?
Probably one of the factors that's driving that change is the Westpac partnership. The management expense ratio we report there does include the commissions payable to partners, and with Westpac, we expect to be increasing the amount we pay in commissions. Also, our view on future spend, both on technology and on brand, has changed to warrant more investment in those areas.
Okay, thank you. I guess just going back to GWP, because I think it's quite an important topic, you know, factored into your longer-term growth assumptions, you know, we saw the Westpac partnership announced earlier this year, which has obviously been in the works for quite some time.
Do you have any other partnership agreements which you're baking into those longer-term assumptions that we don't know about today?
Certainly when we look at our growth over the medium to long term, we are looking to bring on new partners. Tower is always looking to obtain growth from that.
Okay, thank you. I might just ask one last question. You know, you've lowered your large event allowance from NZD 50 million to NZD 45 million. I appreciate that your reinsurance costs have come down a little bit, but can you just talk us through the rationale behind that, I guess, particularly given your excess for large events has increased year- on- year from 2025 to 2026?
Yeah, we are continually reevaluating those expenses, and it builds on the trends we have seen. Clearly, we've had a couple of years of benign large events.
Looking at that long-term information that drives our guidance has changed the view slightly there. There is also definitely a significant improvement in our risk exposure, particularly for flood, and we've seen the average asset at risk, average annual losses, sorry, reducing for that. We expect probably slightly less frequency of large events than we had previously, but we're also expecting some benefit to lower cost of large events through that improved risk selection.
Great, thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Next question comes from James Lindsay from Forsyth Barr. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Augus, and congratulations on the result, and thanks for taking some questions.
Maybe if I just start and carry on in that last phase, you've obviously moved from 87% to 91% with housing at low risk, and that's driven that 21% decrease in flood costs. What are you targeting to get that percentage to over the next year, and could that drive a couple of years out a further reduction in that large event allowance from 45%?
Yes, you're right. We've definitely, oh, good morning, James, I should say first. We've definitely seen an improvement in loss expectations around flood. Probably for flood, we've reached the sort of the position that is our target, so we've got that increased benefit coming through from that. What we would expect to see in the next one to two years is the benefit of the risk-based pricing changes that we made earlier this year for landslope and for sea surge.
They're not as significant perils as flood is, but we would expect to see some improvement in the risk profile for both of those hazards, which should drive an improvement in future years.
Just on the flood, sorry, the sea surge changes you've made, how many policies would you think that will sort of be moved off the books because of those changes?
We're expecting on the whole probably pretty small movements in terms of policy numbers, but it will likely result in a bit of a decrease in average premiums as some of those customers have larger premiums and because we're reducing premiums for around 90% of our customers due to the new risk-based pricing.
Yeah, thanks, Then o bviously, well done on the NPS scores. It's a nice little level it is at. Just interested in your view if that helps improve retention as well.
I mean, that ticked up 1%, but would you expect that to be lifting more given the NPS improvements?
Hi, James, Paul here. We absolutely are looking for small improvements in retention as we go forward. It does vary very much by portfolio, but fundamentally, the better customer service that we can offer, then we do expect that to flow through to retention. That improvement in customer service as represented by NPS has helped our retention this year. Absolutely.
Thanks for that. Obviously, you've given some information with regard to the development and AI with sort of talking about improving workflows and processes and the contact center. Is it all cost out rather than sort of new product or sort of customer experience? Yeah, where's the benefit really in dollar terms versus the spend? Just interested in your view.
Yeah, good question.
The first thing to say is that every bit of AI investment that we do is very targeted with an ROI on it. That ROI, though, does split itself between customer improvement benefits, driving revenue improvement, or between cost-out benefits as well. Some of that future year loss management expense ratio reduction will be enabled by a lot of what we're doing this year in AI.
Yeah, got it. Actually, just going back to the Westpac deal, I understand the question before with regard to sort of the bankbook. What ability do you have about providing sort of updated pricing to those existing Westpac customers? Is there any marketing allowed to the bankbook or just trying to understand about the nuances of new versus the old customers, at least having an opportunity to look at your pricing?
Are you allowed any contact with them at all?
We can, or we in partnership with Westpac can market generally across their entire customer base. If there are customers with existing policies within receiving that marketing and they're interested in taking out a policy, we can issue them a policy. We're just not able to do targeted marketing to that particular portfolio of customers, but they are captured within the general marketing audience. Also, if they were to happen to go into a branch and talk to a personal banker for any reason, they might choose to have a conversation with that personal banker about insurance, and we would be able to deliver that then.
Yeah, got it.
Yep, yeah, it was a nuance I was trying to see is that you're actually allowed to, from a Westpac perspective, email them with, "hey, have you reviewed your policies, etc.?" And that's an allowed activity.
No, that's not quite correct. What I was saying is that those sort of general marketing campaigns we are able to send out to the entire base.
Got it. Again, well done. It's actually just the last one, just on the dividend and capital position. Obviously, a big uplift in sort of more than 100% of EPS payout for the period. Sort of your view about the 143% from a capital perspective, about what is a reasonable range under the new guidelines?
So that $89 million worth of solvency margin is just above our target solvency margin. We're happy with having a solvency position at that level, but obviously as the business grows, we would need some additional capital for business growth, which would increase our target solvency margins. We would expect that number to increase a little with business growth in future years.
Got it. Maybe just a last one from me, just with regard to the sort of nuances. Obviously, Motor's been on pricing has been under a lot of pressure. Has there been any alleviation of the pressure there or any sort of update on the specifics of Motor versus dwelling pricing?
Yeah, hi, James. Most definitely. The pricing has been driven by both our changing view of the technical view of price, so that's sort of our underlying claims expenses, but also the sum insureds of motor vehicles.
We are starting to see a drop in the reduction in some insureds of motor vehicles. We are looking at what our technical price is all the time, but at the moment we are kind of happy with that level. We are not looking to change that too much, but this is the change in motor vehicle some insureds. We will start to flatten that out. As Angus said earlier to a previous question, we are expecting pricing to be reasonably flat this year.
Got it. Thanks, guys, and pass back, and appreciate the time.
Thanks, James.
Thank you. Thank you for all the questions. This concludes the Q&A session. I will now hand back to Michael for closing remarks.
Not many questions, so thank you everyone for taking part, and well done to management on a great year.
This concludes today's conference call.
Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.