“The [imminent] return of mainland visitors should be the single most important growth driver for Hong Kong’s insurance industry,” said UBS Global Research’s China analyst Kelvin Chu. A UBS survey conducted between late September and early October showed that 60 per cent of the China respondents, who intend to buy Hong Kong insurance coverage, will make their trips within 12 months of the border reopening, he said.

Wong is one of the 120,000 insurance agents in Hong Kong whose sales are dependent on the open border with southern China, as the city’s regulations ban the online sales of life insurance policies to mainlanders, requiring customers to physically present themselves in the city to sign for their coverage.

Policy sales to mainlanders started to decline in 2017, following the imposition of curbs by Beijing on overseas payments in 2016. But a much harder blow was dealt in 2020 after cross-border traffic came to a standstill when the pandemic struck.

Mainlanders spent only HK$1 billion on new individual life insurance policies in the first nine months of 2022, accounting for 0.9 per cent of the overall premium, according to Insurance Authority data. This is a far cry from the HK$43.4 billion mainlanders spent in Hong Kong in 2019, accounting for 25 per cent of the total.

Not one to give up, Wong shifted her focus to serve clients in Hong Kong over the past three years. Insurers in the city, in fact, continued to hire during the pandemic, bringing laid off flight attendants on board to sell to local clients.

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“As someone who was born and brought up in Hong Kong, I understand the needs of Hongkongers,” she said. “The pandemic has also made people rethink their priorities, which has resulted in rising demand for health and life coverage.”

Wong persisted with her efforts to sign up new customers even when Hong Kong had the tightest social-distancing measures in place, which resulted in restaurants, cinemas, gyms and mahjong parlours staying closed for quite some time. “I signed policy applications with customers in cars, in parks and even outside their front door wearing a protective outfit.”

That perseverance paid off as Wong was among the top salespeople at Manulife over the past three years. Now with the border reopen, she is looking forward to connecting with her mainland customers.

In the week since China reopened the border with Hong Kong on January 8, a total of 46,343 mainland visitors crossed the land border, compared with 20,517 visitors the previous week, according to data from the Immigration Department. The increase in visitors came after Beijing pivoted away from its long-standing zero-Covid policy and lifted its quarantine mandate from January 8.

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To tap business from mainland clients crossing over into Hong Kong, Manulife, AIA and Prudential said they would hire a combined 10,000 new agents this year.

“We are planning to recruit 5,000 financial planners this year to seize the huge market opportunities brought about by the overall economic recovery of the city and border reopening,” said Alger Fung, CEO of AIA Hong Kong and Macau.

According to a survey conducted by AIA last year, nearly 60 per cent of mainland Chinese respondents said they plan to visit Hong Kong within a month of the border reopening. Those surveyed were also interested in buying insurance in Hong Kong because of the availability of a range of life, medical and critical-illness products.

Asset diversification, potentially compelling long-term returns, access to offshore medical resources and better pricing made Hong Kong insurance products attractive to mainland consumers, UBS’s Chu said.

AIA, HSBC Life and Manulife have set up luxury customer service centres in the tourist hotspot of Tsim Sha Tsui. The insurers are also looking forward to the long-awaited plan to set up after-sales service centres in Nansha and Qianhai in Shenzhen for customers from the mainland who have bought policies in Hong Kong.

Edward Moncreiffe, the CEO of HSBC Life Hong Kong, attributed the success to the introduction of new medical products and digital services. Before the pandemic, HSBC Life received about 40 per cent of its new premium from mainland customers, Moncreiffe said, adding that he expected to get back to that level over time “driven by our strong and trustworthy brand and proven global offshore wealth capability”.

During the pandemic HSBC set up two HSBC Life Paramedical Centres in prime areas – K11 Atelier in Tsim Sha Tsui and Hysan Place in Causeway Bay – near the bank’s wealth management centres to provide insurance, medical check-up and vaccination services to high net worth clients from Hong Kong and the mainland.

Patrick Graham, CEO of Manulife Hong Kong and Macau, said his firm plans to recruit more than 3,000 new agents this year, adding to its roster of 11,600.

“Manulife is encouraged by the resumption of cross-border travel, which will boost the revival of Hong Kong’s economy and benefit many businesses and individuals,” Graham said.

“The pandemic of the last three years has brought into sharp relief the importance of financial planning and having access to quality healthcare,” he said. “Our business in Hong Kong has been gearing up for the reopening of the border. All our sales and servicing channels are ready to serve the mainland Chinese customers.”

Turner said Prudential has prepared products favoured by mainlanders, including multicurrency savings policies and medical and critical illness plans.

The percentage of premium paid by mainland customers in Hong Kong will return to 15 per cent this year, compared with 0.9 per cent in the first nine months of 2022, he added.

The Hong Kong Federation of Insurers, the industry guild, is cautiously optimistic. While the border reopening will bring mainland visitors back to the city, they may not rush to buy insurance products immediately, according to CEO Selina Lau Pui-ling.

“Insurance is also not a daily necessity, so people may not necessarily rush to Hong Kong to buy policies,” she said. “However, we are cautiously optimistic that the cross- border traffic will return to normal and insurance sales to mainland visitors will gradually go up.”