Background and Ethical Question
Organisations are entities that exist in a community with a sole purpose to maximise profit for the company’s financial survival. Corporate managers come up with genius ways of extracting money from the consumers; some of their methods are legal while others are not. While managers are striving to increase their company’s financial figures, some boundaries might be overlooked leading to unfair business practices. These discriminatory practices could cause harm to the stakeholders and the community. Therefore, the concept of corporate governance is established to monitor the business conducts towards the society, lest the companies prosper in the expense of the community through unfair trade practices. Here, Youi’s ethical issues are discussed in the view of corporate governance theories researched through scholarly articles.
Two victims, who thought they were insured by Youi insurance Company, found themselves stranded after major hits of natural catastrophes. Ms Murphy, a mother of three, has been struggling with her insurers over the natural calamity that faced her on November 2016. She reported the Hailstorm issue to her insurers hoping to be compensated for her roof and car, however, her efforts proved futile. She has had to live with the damaged roof for over one year after the catastrophe (Hamilton 2016 p 48). Still, another Youi’s customer complaints were raised concerning the company’s ways of providing slow service or even delaying at the expense of customers suffering. Glen Sutton from Queensland has the full experience of the firm’s incapacity to do right by their customers. After a disastrous hit of cyclone Debbie on March 2017, Sutton and his family have been forced to live in the most undesirable living conditions. They have had to live in many temporary accommodations since their house was not fit to live in.
Youi insurance is an Australian company that was founded on March 2018. The company is privately owned and is a subsidiary of OUTsurance international Holding which is also part of merchant insurance holding. Under the appointed Chief Executive Officer, Frank Costigan, the company is striving to establish a strong brand name in Australia as one of the players in the insurance market. Currently, the company offers products ranging from vehicle, home (building and content), watercraft and business liability. Youi prides itself in their strict adherence to the set code of practice that has, within it, the predetermined standards of practice towards their customers (Outreville 2012, p 3). Their main slogan that also provides a framework within which the company conducts itself is “awesome service” for its entire customers. Recently, Youi insurance is facing vigorous scrutiny from Banking royal commission for serious ethical issue.
In that context, the firm’s vivid negligence towards the customer is wanting as it has managed to capture the attention of the Banking royal commission. The service rendered to their two clients, evidently, has been beyond the company’s standard and code of practice (Naylor 2017, p 120). Youi insurance firm does not show “awesome service” from the two clients’ cases availed above. Concerning the ethical question, the issue above could be paraphrased to; how unethical practices in the insurance sector, affects both the customer and the insurance company.
Company’s Background
Corporate social performance model was developed to keep the firms within the parameters of being socially responsible (Holme and Watts 2005, p 4). It contains three elements to it, the first one being the social responsibilities category; in this, the firm’s elements such as discretion responsibility, ethical, legal and economic responsibility are examined (Wood 2010, p 53). Secondly, social responsiveness category where a company’s way of responding to social issues concerning them are determined to know the level of their social responsibility to the community they operate in and lastly, social issues of stakeholder.
This is the volunteering capability of a company to the society. Depending on the interest of the organisation, companies have the free will to engage in any philanthropic activities for the benefit of the society (Jamali and Mirshak 2007, p 246). For instance, Youi insurance company has been in many volunteering activities that benefit many Australian. To exemplify this, recently, Youi as corporate was involved in a farmers fundraising where they rose over $20000 for the well being of farmers and their project.
The most fundamental aspect of an organisation to the society is to be the economic drive power to the community (Heal 2005, p 403). Corporate has a burden of availing goods and services that the community needs to ensure their economic aspects are stable for the continuity of the society. Youi insurance company has managed to capture the economic needs of its society. Through Youi insurance firms, the society gets products ranging from vehicle, home (building and content), watercraft and business liability. This type of business is of importance to Australians for they are insured against natural calamities such that befall on Ms Murphy, which most cases are beyond the individual control.
Beyond the legal requirement of a business, there are societal expectations that exist from communities. Although not distinctively defined, a firm is expected to act, in its decision making, morally and just, relatively to the society (De Hoogh and Den Hartog 2008, p 307). When present in the court, Youi as a firm, accepted that it had not acted as ethical as to their standards required. They acknowledged their misdeeds to Ms Murphy and Mr. Sutton by delaying the house repairs caused by the natural calamities that they were insured against of which it should not have happened at all.
Although a societal expectation is put on companies to improve the community’s economic activities, it is expected of them to do so within the statutory requirement of the country (Ni and Wart 2015, p 176).Youi insurance firm is within the legal parameters of the country. It is under the regulation of Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) as well as a member of the Insurance Council of Australia. These regulatory bodies ensure that Youi acts as per the stipulated law of the country concern insurance firms. Therefore, there exists no reason as to why the firm delays customers’ claims for over a year
To ensure the firm’s financial continuity and its well being the firm has to link its values with that of the society. A Company’s long-term survival tactic is to get close to the environment to which they conduct business; this means working closely with the society (Dempsey 2015, p 338). For instance; Youi has involved itself in numerous projects that could potentially add value to the society and them as well. As insurance firm, Youi has grabbed the opportunity and its working closely with Red Cross to donating blood that ends up saving over 2000 Australian lives. Such strong initiative should not be tarnished by their firms’ incapability to renders services for the two clients with damaged roofs.
Corporate Social Performance
These corporate social responsibilities are designed in a way that accommodates and touches everyone affected by the decisions made by Youi insurance company. In other words, Youi decisions directly affect the company’s stakeholders of which, the community is one of the major stakeholders (Garvare and Johansson 2010, p 740). Therefore, the Australian community has rights to consider business activities as beneficial or hazardous to them
Stakeholders are among the many factors that could affect the achievement of organizational goals and objectives. To further explain this, stakeholders are individuals who can be affected by the organization’s operations or affect the company from reaching its goals. In respect to that, it evident that these individuals could be many depending on the company’s range of influence. The theory urges that it is of benefit to the company if the directors pay attention to the needs and interests of non-shareholder stakeholders ((Rose 2007, p 327)). The theory has a particular inclination toward normative validity, the purpose of the organization. This purpose covers and reflects on organization’s ethical standard. The central argument of the theory is that the loyalty of the non-shareholder stakeholder influences the prosperity of the organization. Also, as per theory, directors are responsible for protecting the interest for stakeholder since they do not have the right to vote or regulate the company.
Stakeholder Analysis
There are five fundamental questions to be answered in a bid to analyze the stakeholders effectively.
Does the stakeholder have a crucial impact on the organizations?
Youi insurance company has numerous stakeholders that have a different impact on the organization. The most vital of them is the shareholders who have stock shares of the company (Ayuso and Argandoña 2009, p 2). For example, the principal investors of Youi insurance are the Rand Merchant Holdings that have 58% shares on the mother company OUTsurance. Second on the list is the customers; they are the sole reason for the conduction of business. Therefore, they should be served with utmost care with no delays of service rendered to them.
What does the organization want from its stakeholders?
Youi insurance is focused on growing the firms’ brand to be the most recommended brand among insurers. They want from their customer, loyalty as well as revenue for the financial stability of the firm (Dempsey 2015, p 323). From the community, Youi seeks support and acceptance from the community evidenced by the many community service done. The firm wants continued support from its shareholders and professionalism from the employee.
Are the relationships dynamic?
Youi relationship with the community is dynamic; it continuously grows day by day as the company continues to engage in social responsibilities. Also of dynamic is the customer’s relationship, besides a few sets back, for instance, Mr. Sutton and Ms. Murphy’s cases, the company seeks to increase its market share throughout the country
Can the firm easily exist without or replace the stakeholder
Youi Company cannot survive without any of its stakeholders since majors stride have been made toward establishing a long-lasting relationship. This is among the company’s strategy for achieving longer-term goals
Social Responsibilities
Are the stakeholder been identified through another relationship?
Youi insurance company sees consumers differently from the community yet the same. In that, the company’s customers comprise of the community, yet not all community member are their consumers of their products. Therefore, as they perform their civic duty to the society, they do it in such a way they impress both the customer and the community through the shared value.
Most of the decision that an organisation makes concerning business ventures are from the board of directors. They are responsible of the strategies of the company and the overseers of the company’s conducts. Similarly, Youi insurance company also has a board of directors who have been assigned different sections and responsibility. Francis Costigan is the CEO and director of Youi holdings; he has duties over his fellow executive member and to the company as well (Tsui et al. 2006, p 130). Daniel Matthee is the company’s Executive director; he is responsible for managing the company in accordance with the strategies set by the board of directors (Dibb et al. 2005, p 850). Finally, the board is chaired by C.Corfe who manages and avail leadership to the board member as a whole. Worth mentioning is Claudine Ogilvie, who has recently joined the board as a non-executive, she brings her expertise of technology, cyber security and to deliver customer-focused strategies that will see the company to new heights.
Being a member of Australian Securities Exchange, the body has outlines principles recommendation on corporate governance practices. These set practices are set in efforts to hinder such occurrences of misconducts where customers complain such as Murphy and Sutton faced. In accordance to the Council’s recommendations the company has to;
In this sector, Youi insurance company has managed to do relatively well. There is a sound layout of management of the company, board members and directors are assigned responsibilities as per the company policies and the council’s recommendation (Bear et al. 2010, p 218). To exemplify, as aforementioned, the Chief Executive of the company is Francis Costigan who is the overall overseer of the company’s direction with the help of seven other board member. The number is sufficient to have handled customers complain that would have otherwise not reached the Banking royal commission’s attention.
This category requires the company to have adequate numbers of board members who are committed to their duties. The size of the board member is enough, where some of the board members have vast experience in the insurance sector for almost ten years. This is yet to explain the slanginess found in executing the company’s service to its customers. Therefore, the delays experiences of the two clients are doing more harm than good to the firm.
While the better part of the company’s decisions has been within the parameters of moral responsibility, from the recent cases, it would be safe to mention that the company strayed off the main ethical road (Ruedy and Schweitzer 2010, p 74). Nothing close to moral nature is represented in forcing a family to live in temporary houses due to their negligence of duties to their customers and an abstract sense, the community.
Discretion Responsibility
The council recommends that firms establish honesty and transparency in the financial report. The auditing team should be chaired by independent individuals and should have at least three members. Youi Company has met all the standards and requirement tailored following the firms’ policies.
Youi insurance company has been working within the stipulated Council’s recommendations, therefore have little or no disclosure to report. However, concerning principle number three of ethics, the firm delayed customer claims for over a year. Thus, ethical standards were not met. Hence, this deserves a disclosure.
Youi being a subsidiary of OUTsurance Company that has Rand Merchants investment holdings as its principal shareholder respects its shareholders (Goga 2014, p 96). Although the primary interest of the shareholder in gaining profit, also maintaining an acceptable ethical standard that does not go beyond Murphy’s case could be their interest as well. The company needs to rectify the circumstances to do right by their shareholders.
Council’s practice recommends that the company should have a system that manages risk for the company (Council 2007, p 23). A bad reputation is a potential risk the Youi business; hence, the management ought to have handled the customers’ issue in a better way before reaching the Banking royal commission.
Youi insurance company has set the requirement in accordance with the Council’s recommendation for remuneration. The company offers employees numerous opportunities to climb through the corporate ladder where there are significant financial rewards relative to the weight of their duties and responsibility.
The ethical issue that faces Youi deserves a closer look into it to determine how morally the company behaved toward its two clients. The deontological normative theory focuses on the moral obligation of an individual (Alexander and Moore 2007, p 53). This theory gives no attention to the consequences of an individual action whether the results turned out to be good or bad. Additionally, the argument pays attention to the sincere intention of a deed from an individual; therefore, if a person engages in a good act with the non-virtuous intention, then the actions will be considered immoral.
In regards to this view, Youi Company delays the repairs of both Ms Murphy and Mr. Sutton for over a year with the intention to cut the claim cost associated with the repairs. Evidenced by Sutton’s assessor’s biased comment “The insured has a habit of overdramatising everything and creating an environment where you feel obligated to just approve it so we can move forward.” This shows that the company’s intentions were not to repair the roof; they merely wanted to move on. With a deep consideration that Youi insurance company has duties over their customers, to which they ignored for over a year. Especially, when the responsibilities are stipulated in the company’s policies, the company stands to be ethically immoral.
Rawls approach toward justice stipulates that we cannot, with any amount of precision, know our exact place in the community (Amartya 2017, p 46). His approach posits that there are some fundamental rights such as right and liberties, freedom of movement to mention a few. What is of most interest is the difference principle that argues that inequality in social and economic goods are condoned when it benefits the least disadvantaged in the society. Additionally, libertarian theory suggests that everyone is rational in their thought (Robin 2009, p 145). This rationality will lead people to know what is good and what is bad. With that said, in the case of Mr. Sutton and Ms Murphy, it would be justice for them when the company uses its economic resource to sort out the client’s repair expenses. The company, under the management at under libertarian theory, ought to be rational enough to realise what is good and bad for their customers.
Economic Responsibility
The insurance company is facing some serious scrutiny from royal banking commission. This could potentially destroy the brand name that they have worked so hard to build (Freeman et al. 2007, p 2). In would be advisable for the firm to quickly handle the cases by reasonably compensating Ms Murphy and Sutton for their claims. This way, the clients would stop spreading negative word of mouth that has the power to change customers’ attitude toward the Company.
Secondly, due to the negative impression made by the two clients, the firm should use their resource to gain customer confidence. The ethical issue affecting companies have an adverse effect that arises from the community, this is because what is moral is only a subject to the societal view. Therefore, the company should use their e-resources such as a website to clarify the issues to their stakeholder (Gupta 2008, p 756). Efforts should be put to clear the already recreated contrary notion from the public; this shall see to it that the customers’ confidence in the firm is retained.
Lastly, the company should improve its communication with its customers and upgrade is service standard. As Mr. Sutton was striving to get the company’s attention for his predicaments, he states that the communication between the firm and him was weak. Perhaps, this could explain the delays experienced in the repair efforts by the insurance organisation. Mr. Sutton said he felt “very bullied and very intimidated” at times. The intimidation that Sutton felt only indicates that Youi has to change and improve their customers’ service to the acceptable levels by the set code of practice.
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