The boss of a new combined insurance giant which has doubled in size, and which now employs more than 450 people in the island, says the business weathered the economic storm caused by Covid-19.

David Kneeshaw said the island’s safety and stability as a place to do business appeared to have gone down well with international clients.

The chief executive of the International Financial Group (IFGL) was speaking as the final seal was put on a deal to acquire Castletown-based Friends Provident International (FPI) from Aviva.

No jobs have been lost and around 450 people now work for the combined insurance giant in the island with Mr Kneeshaw promising it was likely that they would be looking to recruit more people.

It was first revealed two years ago that IFGL, the owner of the RL360 brand, based in Cooil Road, Douglas, had reached an agreement with the Aviva Group to acquire FPI, but it was all subject to regulatory approval.

Mr Kneeshaw said: ’I am delighted that the acquisition has been completed and we can now focus on our exciting plans for FPI and IFGL.

’Now the really hard work begins. I believe strongly the deal will benefit FPI’s policyholders, financial advisers and staff.

’Our growth strategy remains unchanged.

’And we will continue to look for opportunities to grow.’

He predicted there could be further acquisitions ahead.

IFGL comprises RL360, RL360 Services, Ardan International and now Friends Provident International.

Business News suggested that it appeared to have taken quite some time for the final approval to come through.

He said: ’It has taken more than two years. We had to get approval from a number of regulators. But these days quite a number of mergers and acqusitions deals involving insurance companies do take some time.

’The world scrutinises these things in much more detail, it took a little bit longer than we would have hoped but the end result is good for customers. We’re fairly relaxed and we always thought the deal would get there in the end.

’It’s good for everyone and it doubles us in size’

The group now employs around 700 staff across offices worldwide and administers assets of £17 billion for more than 230,000 customers.

Mr Kneeshaw said it was ’extraordinary’ how well the staff at RL360 adapted to a new way of working during the lockdown.

’At RL360 within 10 working days we were entirely a home-based company apart from four people looking after IT and our scanning room. It worked well and to government standards, customer complaints were almost zero.

’And our new business was also a bit of a revelation. We set a lot of targets last November for the year ahead and currently up to the end of June, we are running at 87% of those initial targets.

’I think it is amazing and what has become apparent is that a lot of our customers are international, ex pats and people working around the world. It seems that a lot of people in this uncertain world want to leave their money in a safe place and there is a lot in the Isle of Man that is attractive to them.

’We got a lot of business from people.

’Time will tell the full analysis of why we got the business we did but to run 87% of our original targets is amazing.’

In addition nobody has been furloughed, nobody has lost their jobs and there have been no redundancies.

’Now most of the staff are back at the office and we are looking forward to the future.’