Swiss Life Switzerland has announced that it increased payments to insureds in 2009 by 36.6% to just over CHF 2.4 billion. With a payment ratio of 92.1% clearly exceeding the legal requirements, interest paid on retirement savings was also well above guaranteed levels. At the same time, administration costs fell by 5.6%. Swiss Life also further extended its range of Swiss employee benefit solutions.
Excellent results
Swiss Life’s 2009 BVG (2nd pillar) results improved on those of 2008, achieving a total result of almost CHF 7.6 billion, partly due to excellent investment returns. Insureds received a payout ratio of 92.1%, well above the legal minimum and the market average. Policyholders also benefited from market-leading interest rates: 2.4% on the mandatory portion of retirement savings, and 2.8% on supplementary retirement savings.

At the end of 2009, Swiss Life’s BVG portfolio covered almost 600,000 insureds from over 30,000 companies, representing a 29.4% share of the market.

Full range provider
In order to serve its clients even more comprehensively, Swiss Life has now introduced two new solutions for corporate clients:

- Swiss Life Business Invest - a new part-autonomous benefit solution aimed at small and medium-sized enterprises and offering higher investment returns than classical full insurance
- Swiss Life Prisma Invest - which provides a choice of investment options and thus higher return opportunities for companies with ten employees or more

Services to large and mid-sized companies have also been enhanced with the strengthening of Swiss Life Pension Services, which provides advisory support in all areas connected with the second pillar.