2024 Executive Outlook | Christian Fournier, Beneva

Christian Fournier, executive vice president and leader – property and casualty insurance, Beneva

With inflation continuing to affect every citizen and organization, one could say 2024 will be the same as 2023. Consumers will be living on a tight personal budget, insurance companies will be struggling to cope with the rapid pace of inflation, and consumers looking for a good insurance product at an affordable price will have to continue shopping.

On the other hand, for insurance companies, the future has never been so unpredictable. Considering the current geopolitical, economic and climate instabilities, one might need a crystal ball to predict the impact of all the various scenarios. More importantly, which scenario will it be next year — 2024 or 2023. Let’s look at a few examples of how next year could be different from this past year…

Climate change has generated an increased frequency of natural disasters. In the past 12 months, major events ranging from high winds, torrential rains, ice storms, and forest fires have impacted millions of Canadians. Without being able to predict the type and scale of events to hit us in 2024, we must prepare for the unexpected; our priority must remain to support our policyholders through difficult times.

Luckily for consumers, help should be on the way. The Government of Canada has committed to a national flood insurance solution, something for which the industry — through the Insurance Bureau of Canada — has advocated for many years. Beneva has confirmed its support for this proposal because Canadians need this type of change. 2024 should be a banner year for this program.

We can also do things as individual companies to help. Beneva is committed to achieving net-zero by 2050. This is not only a gesture: it’s a commitment to change the way we do things, ranging from how we manage our buildings and vehicle fleet to how we manage claims and ultimately our insurance products.

Finally, the economy over the past few years has resulted in several issues we need to tackle. Auto theft comes to mind. Our clients and our industry suffered losses of more than $1 billion due to auto fraud in 2022, which is worsening in 2023. We must curb that trend in 2024. If we are to achieve that, insurers will need to partner with police forces and all three levels of Canadian governments.

All things considered, maybe 2024 won’t be more of the same after all…