For decades, there’s been a fundamental gap in the global insurance industry: it’s one-sided. In general, insurance is under-loved, underappreciated, and a begrudging “must-have” that only pays out in a crisis – yet businesses and employees pay for it their whole lives. But there’s yet to be a solution to the wellness crisis erupting across the globe. So at YuLife, we decided to unpack holistic wellbeing, and solve the problem many have been facing. YuLife is a life-altering insurance provider and benefits offering that transforms workplaces with financial, mental and physical wellbeing programmes using gamification and behavioural economics.The goal? To shift the decades-old understanding of what insurance really means and why people need it and lead to building healthier, more productive workplaces everywhere. Changing the story of insurance After decades of being looked at the same, YuLife has created what’s widely considered the “first-ever lifestyle insurance app”. We want insurance not to be something you begrudge to purchase or something you only use in the case of crises. "YuLife has a big mission: we want to help people to live their best lives, and we are passionate about using tech and financial services as a force for good." Sammy Rubin, FounderWe think it should go hand-in-hand with benefits that encourage you to live a better life holistically, and that you should be able to reap the benefits – whether in good or ill health.That’s why our app offers a suite of standard, comprehensive insurance products to protect you when you need it most, but also provide key benefits to inspire you to live a better life today, and resources to prevent poor health.In other words: YuLife puts all the power of insurance and benefits into your employees’ pockets – to create an experience that engages, rewards and protects your people.At the core of our offering is group cover benefits to create attractive reward packages and alleviate financial stress for your employees. Providing a financial lifeline to people when they need it most allows them to live their best lives at work, and outside.This includes: Funeral cover → Provides a fixed amount of money to a YuLife member’s family in the event of their death, helping to cover the costs of their funeral. The member’s spouse and up to five children can also be covered (up to R100 000).Lump sum disability cover → Provides a once-off lump sum of money to the YuLife member directly in the event of their permanent disability, helping to support the member if they cannot earn an income on a permanent basis. Income Protection → Provides a monthly payment if a YuLife member is unable to work for an agreed duration, due to illness or injury. The amount paid is based on a percentage of the employee’s salary and can be on a temporary or permanent basis.Life cover → Provides money to a YuLife member’s nominated beneficiaries in the event of their death, helping to ease financial pressures in tragic circumstances. This can be a lump sum based on a multiple of the employee’s salary, or, a fixed amount. The member’s spouse can also be covered on a similar basis.EAP → Offering easy access to legal, financial, family and mental support through difficult times with Lyra Wellbeing for an employee and their immediate family. Employees also. get access to virtual GPs on-call 24/7 via Kena Health.A focus on wellness The wellness crisis is on the rise across the globe – in fact, it’s been found that 80% of chronic illnesses are a result of lifestyle factors that can be changed. And it’s not only impacting employees’ long-term health but also productivity. Studies have shown absenteeism in South Africa costs organisations R12 billion to R16 billion each year, and some think it’s even higher – an equivalent to 15% of people being absent daily.Workplaces everywhere are being forced to step up their wellbeing offerings and wellness programmes quicker than ever before.We wanted to make it as easy as possible for you to do so – and what better way than integrating it into a product you already have? That’s why our all-in-one platform equips your team with the necessary benefits and insurance cover that they need on a daily basis – while kicking it up a notch to make earnings even higher, and resources extra accessible, while still maintaining the price.Now, most people ask us: “what’s the catch?”.But there isn’t one!We saw an opportunity to do better by our clients and give more back to them so they can have a better workplace wellness solution that staff will value and use: from wellbeing challenges, virtual GP access, on-demand mental health, financial protection and rewards.The more wellbeing activities they participate in – the more rewards they get. Rewards for Wellbeing Having a mobile app makes insurance and benefits not only easy to access – but adding in a rewards system makes it endlessly more engaging. The YuLife app is powered by YuCoin – the in-app currency that converts wellness activities into tangible rewards from vouchers you can use at your favourite brands, all the way to paying your groceries or generator bills. YuCoin is the reward currency YuLifers earn by tracking their daily activity and participating in quests, challenges and competitions. You can complete challenges to get the most YuCoin possible through free access to health and wellness apps. Some of those apps include: Meditopia: A sample selection of guided meditations in-app content available for free foreverFiit: 75% off online membership to Fiit – 500+ on-demand and group workoutsGarmin: Up to 20% off Garmin wearable devicesAlong with accessing the above apps and more, employees earn vouchers and discounts from a network of reward partners like Dischem, Checkers, Engen, Mugg n Bean, Netflorist, Footgear and many more – users can even choose to donate their YuCoin towards good community causes. From sponsoring a meal for a month with Food Forward SA, to planting a tree or cleaning the ocean, YuLife has options to not only benefit users but the community at large. Implementing the power of game mechanics Rewards are extra engaging because the amount users get is relative to their activity. The more they do the more they earn, and the more they earn the higher motivation there is to be healthy – which ultimately leads to higher employee satisfaction and performance at work. This is the power of game mechanics in action with the YuLife app. As you move through wellness challenges in the YuLife app, much like a game, you’re brought through to different worlds and levels that offer different types of challenges and more rewards than before. You consistently unlock new levels, and get chances to earn even more YuCoin with “surges” or “challenges”. Not only this, but the motivation driven by the leaderboards amongst teams encourages healthy competition – as well as a sense of togetherness amongst dispersed workplaces. Several ways that a user earns more YuCoin is through the following: Streaks → Streaks are designed to reward continued activity. If a YuLifer completes a challenge every day for five days in a row, there is an additional bounty of YuCoin awarded for completing the streak.Quests → Daily quests and everyday activities that drive real rewards – this is what encourages the user to log on each and every day to complete their challenges and earn rewards.Chests → Chests deliver a large bounty of YuCoin which can be unlocked every seven quests. This ensures that those who progress through the quests receive the most YuCoin.Duels → The Duel feature sparks friendly competition amongst colleagues. From the Leaderboard, they can select another YuLifer to duel with – just for bragging rights or for a YuCoin wager to make things interesting! The YuLifer with the most steps at the end of the duel wins.Surge events → To celebrate important health and wellbeing events throughout the year, we run in-app campaigns that all YuLife members can participate in. For these key events, we increase the amount of YuCoin a user can earn for a given challenge.Onboarding has never been easier The lifecycle of YuLife in your team is easy, it’s quick, and it’s simple to analyse. With expert help along the way, we help you launch the app, get team members onboarded, and even continuously campaign the app to get your team members involved. But best of all: the data is easily accessible for you to analyse and iterate.Everything you need as an HR professional is available through the HR portal. It gives you simple access to: Your quarterly management info pack: Insights on how employees use the YuLife app including activities, challenges and reward behaviour.Wellbeing trends: Behaviour metrics to show frequency of physical activity and meditation times to predict stress or burnout.Mental health reports: Anonymised company metrics that flag any broad mental health concerns including anxiety, workplace stress, hopelessness and workplace performance (Your employees can opt out of all reporting).New features and tools are coming out all the time to make your job as an HR professional even easier. From earning credits against your premium that can be reinvested into your benefits offering – we want to make this experience just as engaging and rewarding for you. While we pride ourselves on being one of the first-ever lifestyle insurance companies, we pride ourselves even more on our community.With YuLifer’s around the world, bringing people together and inspiring life is at the core of what we do. And if you have questions or want to receive a quote, our YuCrew is here to help. Drop a line here and we’ll guide you through every step of the process. So when the world looks at insurance 5-10 years down the line, we don’t want to think about it being under-loved or under-appreciated. Instead, we want to think of insurance as an opportunity to live your best life – and most of all: Live a life where you love being yu.