Principality Building Society partners with protection experts Vita

30 September 2021

Principality Building Society has partnered with protection specialists Vita to provide their clients and members with some of the best protection advice available in the UK.

Principality, the UK’s sixth largest building society, has over 500,000 members. It specialises in providing savings, mortgages, insurance and commercial loans but recognises that its members need independent advice on protection from experts who are the best in the market at what they do.

Vita is a whole of market protection specialist working with over twenty different insurers. It has arranged over £1billion of cover in just a decade and has a Feefo rating from its clients of five out of five. It will work with Principality across its branch network, providing telephone advice to all Principality members.

Because of the wide number of protection providers that it works with, Vita ensures that every client referred to it not only gets the best value protection available, but, more importantly, its specialists also manage to find cover for clients that many other protection advisers cannot. This includes finding cover for people who struggle to get protection and have been turned down by other providers.

Principality previously had a single tie arrangement which meant it was unable to offer certain products and it was limited by the underwriting outcomes of one insurer. As a whole of market specialist, Vita can ensure that the client is not only getting the lowest cost solution available, but that the cover is tailored around each individual’s financial priorities, health and lifestyle.

Vita specialists will be carrying out training sessions with staff in each of the branches both online and face-to-face. Vita will also provide resources for Principality staff to use with their members when they visit the branch.

Paul Reed, director at Vita, says, “This partnership with Principality, ensures that all of their members will have access to the very best protection advice. It also helps us achieve our aim that insurance should be available for all, regardless of health and lifestyle. Having access to each insurer in the market means we can really drill into the detail of the full suite of protection products, rather than being constrained by that of one insurer.

“What is more, if any client does needs to make a claim, we take them through the claims process step by step, taking away the stress for them and helping ensure that their policy pays out and providing Principality with the reassurance that their members will be looked after every step of the way. Our aim is to close the protection gap for all those who need it.”

Shaun Middleton, Head of Distribution at Principality, says: “This agreement with Vita is really about doing the right thing by our members and ensuring that they are financially resilient for whatever life may throw at them. This is not just about protection for mortgages, it is also adding value across our whole proposition as this partnership doesn’t only benefit those people just taking out protection for the first time. Working with Vita means we can offer every one of our members the opportunity to have a review of their protection requirements.”

In the past five years Vita has grown its presence as a referral partner. It now works with a selection of Building Societies, including Principality, Teachers, Ipswich and Penrith and continues to look for additional banks and societies to partner with to deliver a whole of market solution to their members and clients.

Vita recently won the award for ‘Outstanding Customer Outcomes’, at the Legal & General Business Quality Awards.