SEIB Insurance Brokers granted a total of £100,000 to charity at their Charity Awards luncheon at the Grange City Hotel, London on the 22nd March 2019.
SEIB’s Chief Executive Officer, Barry Fehler presented a cheque for £50,000 and a commemorative plaque to Roly Owers and Emma Williams of the winning charity, World Horse Welfare. Nine other charities reached the final voting stage of the SEIB Charity Awards and received a further £50,000 from SEIB between them.
Barry Fehler said: “I have been at the helm of SEIB for over 50 years and it is with great pride that we are able to make these grants totalling £100,000 to projects voted for by our clients. I am delighted that since last year, with the support of our owners Ecclesiastical, we have been able to double the sum granted by SEIB to charity”.
The SEIB Charity Awards have strict entry criteria; only small and medium charities are eligible and the grant has to be awarded for a specific project. This is to ensure that the money granted will really make a difference. The winning project for World Horse Welfare was for Vital New Equipment, including a new tractor and trailer and a drone with a hi-res camera to help locate horses in need of help in hard to reach locations.
Redwings Horse Sanctuary took the runner-up grant of £15,000 for their Horse Hospital Treatment Room project and the smallest charity of the finalists, the Welsh Pony Rescue and Rehoming Charitable Trust took £10,000 for third place back to South Wales for their Every Life is Precious project. In fourth place was the Animal Health Trust, who were awarded a grant of £5,000 for the Digital X-Ray Appeal which could help diagnose new orthopaedic conditions.
Manchester based, Once Upon a Smile, received the SEIB Small Charity Award. This resulted in a grant of £10,000 for their project, Help Bereaved Families Rebuild Their Lives. Once Upon a Smile offers financial support and respite breaks to bereaved families.
Over 1,000 small-to-medium sized charities were nominated by over 22,000 public votes in the first stage of the decision-making process for the 2019 SEIB Charity Awards. From these charities, a shortlist of finalists was selected and invited to submit detailed plans. The Charities Trust provided SEIB with their help to carry out due diligence to ensure that each of the finalists met all criteria of the grant and are above board. Following this, SEIB customers placed nearly 2,000 votes to decide on the recipient of the £50,000 grant and the runners up. The winner was announced at the SEIB awards ceremony and luncheon.
Barry Fehler continued “We are delighted that our customers have decided which of these very worthy causes should receive the grant. SEIB is so successful because we are totally customer focussed and this is another way that our clients can have their say. Each of the charities that reached the final judging had important projects that would really make a difference to the areas within which they operate and that was our aim when we set up this initiative”.
SEIB works closely with the charitable sector and insure many charities and non-for-profit organisations. Whilst SEIB is an independent broker, the company is owned by the Ecclesiastical Insurance Group that is in turn owned by the charity Allchurches Trust.
Giving is embedded in the culture of SEIB. From supporting grass roots competition that gives opportunities to amateur riders that they could only otherwise dream about, right through to the company’s unwavering loyalty to promoting nationwide equine welfare.
The SEIB team do a huge amount for local charities and SEIB has proudly supported the Burghley Sponsored Ride for the past five-years by covering expenses so all proceeds go to charity.
The other finalist charities, each receiving a grant of £2,000 each are; Bransby Horses Rescue and Welfare, Lindsey Lodge Hospice, James Hopkins Trust, Wildlife Aid Foundation and the South Essex Wildlife Hospital.