This article is part of a series sponsored by Britam

Britam set up on University Way in 1965 as a subsidiary of British-American Holdings Ltd in the Bahamas. In those days Britam was known as British-American Insurance and was in the business of selling insurance to locals. This first office was not large, by any means; and began operations with less than 10 employees. Nonetheless, it was the Africa Regional Head Office and oversaw British-American’s offices in: Uganda, Mauritius and later Nigeria, Ethiopia, Malta, Cyprus, Lebanon and Spain.

Initially, British-American offered small insurance policies for industrial workers which the company referred to as WPs (Weekly Premiums) because the premiums were physically collected from client’s homes every week. The collecting Agents doubled up as the sales team and would visit home after home on motorbikes collecting premiums and selling insurance products. Much like Britam’s insurance operation today, the sales/ collecting agents reported to unit managers who in turn reported to staff mangers and then the regional manager. Today, Britam’s unit managers report to branch managers who then report to the Head Office.

At the time, during the late 60s into the 70s, a 20 Shilling insurance premium paid by a client would earn the collecting agent bragging rights for its magnitude. Consider that the average premium paid was 5 shillings which came with a matching low sum assured – the money payable in the event of a claim. Today, top life insurance agents in Britam rake in up to 1 million shillings every month in premiums. Amazingly, British-American Insurance would entrust the agents to collect and account for the premiums they collected. Today, client’s pay premiums directly pay into Britam’s accounts through an arrangement with local banks.

New products introduced in 1976 enabled monthly premium payments. Data on all premiums and their holders was manually recorded in hard cover books known as WPs (Weekly Premiums) and CBPs (Collection Book Page). When a client came into the company offices to pay a premium, a clerk would have to manually retrieve that client’s last payment details from the books.

This led to issues with client’s who had multiple insurance policies with several agents because payment data could be spread across mounds of different WPs and CBPs. Retrieving such a client’s data could take up to days to the dismay of the client. With so much physical data to manage, employees known as ‘book blockers’ were hired to manually retrieve client data when it was needed.

Meanwhile, changes in British-American’s management and ownership were taking place. In 1978, General Manager Mr. Godfrey Karuri was promoted to company Managing Director where he served until 1981. Mr. Benson Wairegi took over from then and has overseen Britam’s evolution into a financial conglomerate. He still serves as Britam’s top man today as the Managing Director of the Britam Group.

British-American also needed to adjust its ownership structure to fit with new government nationalization laws. Starting in the 1970s, pressure for foreign owned companies to fully localize saw the Kenyan British-American office split into the Mauritius, Uganda and Kenya offices. By 1978 the Kenyan government officially required foreign companies to cede at least one third of their shareholding to local investors. The directive affected British-American which secured the required ownership structure in 1982 through a private treaty with Kenyan investors.

As time went on, manual data recording became problematic as the company faced losses through unrecorded premiums and a de-motivated sales staff because of delayed commissions. More so, as British-American Insurance grew apace the number of insurance policies sold, it became impossible to keep track manually and the company needed a new operational system to support its growth. Such a system would come in 1998 with the introduction of Britam’s first digital logging system that spurred a wave of growth in Britam’s insurance client base across Kenya into what she is today. Stay with us for the story of Britam’s digital transition and growth.