Manulife continues building on its solid membership base

Manulife lays claim to the No 2 spot among MPF providers behind the HSBC, according to Nick Crouch, president and chief executive of Manulife Provident Funds Trust.

'Manulife is very happy with how things have turned out. We got a pretty good market share initially and it has been retained well. So far, there has not been a lot of movement in the market. It is really sticky for all the providers, but, if anything, I think we are gaining more than we are losing. We feel we have ended up with about 15 per cent of the growth in terms of new members coming on as a result of the MPF.'

When the MPF scheme began, Manulife had about 10 per cent of the Occupational Retirement Scheme Ordinance (Orso) market, which implies it has done better in the MPF market, Mr Crouch says. A recent Watson Wyatt survey found Manulife had about 15 per cent of MPF assets by provider.

Manulife has about 200 dedicated MPF staff. The company handles all its MPF business in-house, including administration and investment.

The decision to handle its own administration for MPF was a natural one, Mr Crouch says. Administration systems were already in place to handle Orso business, and so setting up MPF administrative systems was no great challenge.

'Our issue was whether we could get a significant enough share of the market to have a viable block to administer and we were able to do that,' he says.

For the moment, all Manulife's MPF investment options are based on in-house investment funds.