Bringing global expertise to local relationships

By Kevin Charman and Richard Bevins

Hello to our fellow Platinum Business Magazine readers. It’s a great pleasure to be able to introduce ourselves to you and to be sponsoring both the Surrey and Sussex Business Awards in 2021.

The judging process has really brought to life the quality of the businesses we have based in our region and we’re really proud to be part of that community and doing what we can to help businesses really succeed.

Many of you won’t be familiar with the Verlingue name as it’s fairly new to the UK – most people can’t even pronounce it the first time! To put that little issue to bed early, it’s best to think of Verlingue like meringue!!

Grammar lesson over, let’s tell you a little bit about who we, what we stand for and what we do. Verlingue is a fourth generation, familyowned business headquartered in Brittany in France. The UK business is founded on two well established, local businesses, Barnett & Barnett and NBJ which came together with a Manchester based business in 2018 and rebranded to Verlingue in January 2020. This independent, family owned culture is the bedrock of everything we’re building in the UK. It guides our ethical, investment and recruitment strategies and drives our commitment to long term relationships with our clients. That’s why we keep a strong and growing local presence with our offices in Redhill, Egham and London and also why we invest so much in making sure our clients have the best service journey, which is recognised by our Investor in Customers Gold accreditation which we’ve held since 2018.

In terms of “what we do”, put simply, we help businesses understand, reduce and transfer risk in their business, everything from staff safety, cyber resilience or bad debts. Some of this

is achieved through training and consultancy and some of it is done by helping businesses buy the right insurance programme with the right insurer, including cover for assets and people in different areas of the world.

But it’s not all about preventing things from going wrong. Our Employee Benefits teams work with businesses to help them recruit, reward and retain the talent they need by helping them benchmark their employee benefits programmes against competitors in their sector and then helping them implement programmes in the most tax efficient way. In the Covid era, this aspect of the remuneration strategy has become increasingly important especially in the area of staff wellbeing and mental wellness. Often, it’s not about spending more, it’s about spending well. In the insurance sector buying power is influenced by how much premium you place in the market. Our position as a top 15 insurance broker in both the UK and Western Europe also means we have a powerful presence in our market meaning our clients can benefit from very competitive premiums and many other services.

To explore how we may be able to help your business, or simply for a second opinion on your insurance arrangements, please get in touch.