Sberbank clients will have to choose an insurer based on personal preference, Popov noted / Sergey Porter / Vedomosti

In August, Sberbank offices and Sberbank Premier, which serves premium clients, will begin selling auto insurance policies in a pilot mode, but not from its subsidiary Sberbank Insurance, but from third-party companies, said Dmitry Popov, acting CEO of Sberbank Insurance.

For Sberbank Premiere clients, managers will calculate the cost of CASCO policies from four selected insurers: Ingosstrakh, RESO-Garantiya, VSK and AlfaStrakhovanie, Popov said. After this, you will have to go to the insurer to inspect the car, based on the results of which the partner may refuse to conclude an agreement, but has no right to change the cost calculated by Sberbank. If the insurer refuses to sell CASCO, it will have to justify the reason for the refusal to both the Sberbank Premiere client and his manager, Popov clarified.

At the same time, in 11 regions, Sberbank offices will offer "boxed" CASCO products - truncated and standardized, but without the need to inspect the car. The single cost of the policy will be 7,500 rubles, the risks of car theft and damage caused by third parties with repairs at official dealers (for cars up to 10 years old) will be insured, Popov said.

For "boxed" products, the minimum payout limit will be 500,000 rubles, the maximum - 1 million rubles, says VSK Senior Vice President Vyacheslav Karachev. Representatives of Sberbank's other partners did not promptly respond to inquiries.

Sberbank clients will have to choose an insurer based on personal preference, Popov noted: his company insisted on equal prices and insurance conditions. Soon, restrictions will be lifted and partners will be able to compete on terms, but the company will not allow significant differences, he continues.

The insurers selected by Sberbank will be able to improve their client base, which is currently difficult to obtain through their own agents, believes NRA Managing Director Pavel Samiev.

Sberbank Insurance will earn on the commission from partners, Popov did not disclose its size. The commission fee in 2017 on average on the market was 19.3%, says Expert RA analyst Alexey Yanin. The companies selected by Sberbank in 2017 paid 16.6 billion rubles in CASCO fees, or 53% of all fees paid for this type of insurance for the year, calculated ACRA analyst Evgeny Sharapov.

Selling policies from other companies will allow Sberbank's subsidiary to understand whether it needs to enter the market with its own product. "We are not entering the auto insurance market yet," Popov said. He explains this by the fact that CASCO is unlikely to be successfully sold without OSAGO, and Sberbank's insurer is not ready to enter this market in the next two years: "The OSAGO market needs to be stabilized; in a number of regions, the segment is unprofitable. Sberbank is widely represented in the regions; obtaining a license for OSAGO in the current conditions will end with people queuing at branches demanding that they sell them a policy."

Popov also promises to control the quality of claims settlement – this distinguishes the bank from aggregators, which also sell auto hull insurance, but are only interested in commission income.

Sberbank Insurance works primarily on classic types of bancassurance, which are characterized by lower losses than motor types, notes Yanin. If Sberbank's insurer entered the market with its auto hull insurance now, it would "plunge headlong into all the problems of motor insurance and become a target for attack by fraudsters," he continues.

In 2017, the combined loss ratio (including expenses) of auto hull insurance was 73%, which indicates the profitability of the type, Yanin notes. Sharapov expects that Sberbank Insurance will nevertheless enter the market with its auto hull insurance. “In the medium term, we are seriously planning to think about our own OSAGO and hull insurance, but not now,” says Popov.

Sberbank Insurance was going to launch its own sales of casco policies in 2016 and then in 2017, but this never happened. In March 2018, Sberbank Senior Vice President Alexander Bondarenko said that the insurer does not plan to enter this market until 2020.

Sberbank will try on someone else's comprehensive insurance for its clients