Car insurer review
Santam Car Insurance
South Africa’s oldest and largest short term insurer, reviewed in full, cover, cost, ratings and complaints.
1918
Established
22.9%
Market share
AAA(ZA)
Global Credit Rating (GCR)
AM Best A-
Financial strength grade
The verdict on Santam
Santam is South Africa’s oldest and largest short term insurer, founded in 1918 and holding close to 23% of the non-life insurance market, more than double the share of its nearest rival. It carries top tier financial strength ratings from both AM Best and GCR Ratings, and its majority owner, Sanlam, holds a 62.3% stake. For personal car insurance bought through a broker, or direct through its wholly owned subsidiary MiWay, Santam is a financially sound and well established choice. There is one caveat worth knowing before you buy: Santam’s specialist commercial insurance division, Santam Structured Insurance, has repeatedly recorded the highest complaint ratio of any insurer tracked by South Africa’s insurance ombud scheme. This division is separate from the personal motor book most car insurance shoppers would actually buy into, but it carries the Santam name, so it is covered here in full.
What you will learn
- Who owns Santam, and how its history with Sanlam actually works
- What Santam’s car insurance covers, including its SmartPark low mileage discount
- How financially strong Santam is, based on independent credit ratings
- Santam’s customer satisfaction track record, including recent shifts
- The full, transparent picture on Santam’s complaints history
- Santam’s move into Lloyd’s of London through Syndicate 1918
- Who Santam car insurance suits, and who might want to compare further
Who is Santam
Santam was founded on 1 May 1918 in Bellville, Cape Town, as the Suid-Afrikaanse Nasionale Trust en Assuransie Maatskappy. A few weeks later, in June 1918, Sanlam was established as Santam’s life assurance subsidiary. The relationship then flipped over the following decades: Santam controlled Sanlam until 1954, after which Sanlam became independent and eventually became Santam’s largest shareholder. That arrangement still holds today. Sanlam owns 62.3% of Santam, while the remainder trades freely on the JSE under the code SNT, alongside a smaller free float on the A2X and Namibian exchanges.
Now more than 100 years old, Santam is the largest general insurer in South Africa. According to KPMG’s South African Insurance Industry Survey 2025, Santam held a 22.99% share of the non-life insurance market in 2024, well ahead of second placed Hollard at 10.68%, with Old Mutual Insure, Guardrisk, and OUTsurance rounding out the top five. Santam sells personal and commercial short term insurance, including motor, home, agriculture, engineering, and liability cover, primarily through independent brokers. Its direct-to-consumer channel runs through MiWay, a separate short term insurer that Santam has fully owned since 2010, with its own licence, brand, and underwriting rules.
Car Insurance Cover and Discounts
Santam offers comprehensive and third party car insurance for personal and business use, sold mainly through brokers, plus additional cover options such as credit shortfall protection, classic car cover for vehicles over 25 years old, and cover for 4x4s, trailers, caravans, motorcycles, and watercraft. Every policy includes 24/7 emergency roadside assistance at no extra cost, covering breakdowns, flat tyres, and lockouts. Santam also maintains an extensive network of approved repairers across South Africa, which is one of the more consistently praised aspects of its claims process among brokers and policyholders.
SmartPark: save up to 20%
Drivers who cover less than 15,000km a year can save up to 20% on their premium, with the discount calculated across three kilometre bands from 0 to 15,000km. It is aimed squarely at low mileage drivers, including those who work from home or use a second car sparingly.
Is Sanlam financially stable
AM Best affirmed Santam’s Financial Strength Rating at A- (Excellent) and its Long-Term Issuer Credit Rating at a- (Excellent) in December 2025, with a stable outlook, citing strong balance sheet strength and consistent operating performance. GCR Ratings separately affirmed Santam’s national scale financial strength rating at AAA(ZA) and its long term issuer rating at AA+(ZA) in November 2024, also with a stable outlook. On the metrics that determine whether an insurer will still be standing to pay out a claim, Santam sits in the top tier of the South African market.
A-
AM Best rating
AAA(ZA)
GCR national scale
R4.4bn
2024 profit after tax
34.2%
Return on equity
Customer Satisfaction and Claims Experience
Santam built a strong reputation on the South African Customer Satisfaction Index (SAcsi) for short term insurance, holding the outright leadership position for much of the 2014 to 2018 period, with scores consistently above the industry average and the highest net promoter score in the category. That leadership has become more contested since. Independent customer experience benchmarking published in early 2026 placed other insurers, including Auto & General, ahead of Santam on overall customer experience scoring. Read together, the picture is one of a brand with a long, well documented track record of strong service, competing in a market where several direct and niche insurers have closed the gap in recent years.
The Complaint Record You Should Know About
This is the part of Santam’s profile that deserves a direct, unembellished explanation, because it involves the Santam brand name even though it does not involve the personal car insurance product most readers are shopping for.
For four consecutive years, 2020 through 2023, the Ombudsman for Short-Term Insurance (OSTI) recorded Santam Structured Insurance as having the highest complaint ratio, measured as complaints per 1,000 claims, of any insurer in its published tables. The ratio moved from 15.5 per 1,000 in 2020 to 12.6 in 2021, 13.216 in 2022, and 12.943 in 2023. Santam Structured Insurance is a specialist commercial division that handles large and complex risks, an entirely different book of business to the personal motor policies covered in this review.
From 1 March 2024, OSTI merged into the new National Financial Ombud Scheme (NFO), and the reporting method changed from a per-1,000-claims ratio to a raw count of formal complaints opened. Under this new methodology, Santam Limited had the highest number of formal complaints opened of any non-life insurer in 2024, at 684. The NFO’s own Lead Ombud for non-life insurance has been explicit that this figure cannot be read in isolation: complaint volume tracks the size of an insurer’s client base, and Santam is the largest player in the market by a wide margin.
The honest summary: Santam’s mainstream personal motor insurance book is not what drives this complaint history, and the ombud’s own guidance cautions against reading raw complaint counts as a verdict on any insurer. But the Structured Insurance division’s complaint ratio was a genuine outlier for four straight years under the old, size-adjusted methodology, and it is disclosed here because it sits under the same corporate umbrella as the car insurance product being reviewed.
Santam Goes Global: Lloyd’s Syndicate 1918
In July 2025, Santam received in-principle approval from Lloyd’s of London to launch its own syndicate, named Syndicate 1918 after its founding year. Lloyd’s granted final permission in December 2025, and the syndicate began underwriting business on 1 January 2026, with planned gross written premium for its first year in excess of £300 million. The syndicate focuses on international property, marine, energy, political violence and terrorism, financial institutions, professional indemnity, and cyber insurance. This expansion sits well outside the South African personal motor market and has no direct bearing on local car insurance pricing or claims handling, but it does reflect the scale and financial capacity behind the Santam brand.
Is Santam Car Insurance Right for You?
Santam tends to suit drivers who want a financially secure, broker backed insurer with a long claims-paying track record, particularly those who value an extensive approved repairer network and want the option of face to face broker advice. Low mileage drivers stand to gain the most immediate saving, through the SmartPark discount. Buyers who want a fully direct, app based experience without a broker in the middle may prefer to compare Santam’s own direct subsidiary, MiWay, or other direct insurers, since Santam’s core personal lines business is still predominantly broker distributed.
Santam Goes Global: Lloyd’s Syndicate 1918
In July 2025, Santam received in-principle approval from Lloyd’s of London to launch its own syndicate, named Syndicate 1918 after its founding year. Lloyd’s granted final permission in December 2025, and the syndicate began underwriting business on 1 January 2026, with planned gross written premium for its first year in excess of £300 million. The syndicate focuses on international property, marine, energy, political violence and terrorism, financial institutions, professional indemnity, and cyber insurance. This expansion sits well outside the South African personal motor market and has no direct bearing on local car insurance pricing or claims handling, but it does reflect the scale and financial capacity behind the Santam brand.
Is Santam Car Insurance Right for You?
Santam tends to suit drivers who want a financially secure, broker backed insurer with a long claims-paying track record, particularly those who value an extensive approved repairer network and want the option of face to face broker advice. Low mileage drivers stand to gain the most immediate saving, through the SmartPark discount. Buyers who want a fully direct, app based experience without a broker in the middle may prefer to compare Santam’s own direct subsidiary, MiWay, or other direct insurers, since Santam’s core personal lines business is still predominantly broker distributed.
Is Santam a good car insurance company in South Africa?
Who owns Santam Insurance?
Sanlam owns 62.3% of Santam, making it the controlling shareholder. The remaining shares are held by public shareholders, including the Government Employees Pension Fund, and trade on the JSE under the code SNT. Santam and Sanlam share a common founding year, 1918, but have operated as separate companies since Sanlam became independent in 1954.
How much can I save with Santam's SmartPark discount?
Does Santam have a bad complaints record?
Is MiWay the same company as Santam?
Does Santam's international expansion affect its South African car insurance customers?
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