We are committed to ensuring that no form of forced labour, including modern slavery and human trafficking, exists within any aspect of our business or our supply chains.

It sets out the ongoing steps that WSMA has taken to prevent modern slavery from taking place within our business or supply chains.

Our organisation's structure

Ohio Farmers Insurance Company (“OFIC”) is the ultimate parent company of WSMA, with their corporate headquarters at Westfield Centre, Ohio. OFIC is one of the largest non-public companies in Ohio and the largest employer in Medina County, providing personal and commercial insurance.

Our supply chains

Our principal business consists of authorised insurance and reinsurance companies and companies whose purpose it is to support the activities of these companies. As such, we have a relatively simple supply chain model built around supporting our core activities and maintaining our global presence and technology infrastructure.

Our supply chains include: third party information technology service providers, insurance claims-related services, facilities management and consultancy and professional firms specialising in such services as auditing, marketing and legal and human resources.

We are committed to taking appropriate steps to ensure that modern slavery does not occur within any part of our business or supply chains, and we seek to source and purchase all products and services used in our business from suppliers who share this commitment.

Our policies on slavery and human trafficking

The following policies, procedures and training modules support our commitment to mitigate the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking within our organisation and supply chain:

Outsourcing Policy
Whistleblowing Policy
Modern Slavery training
Contractual provisions in contracts

WSMA also employs a Whistleblowing Procedure, in conjunction with its corresponding policy. This procedure allows employees to report certain serious breaches of law in an anonymous way. Following any report of modern slavery within our supply chains, and if required, WSMA will take appropriate action and prevent further damage, including addressing any modern slavery concerns with the relevant supplier and endeavour to agree on a remediation action plan, where appropriate. Contravention of laws and acts can also be made known to the Legal & Compliance department.

Employees and Recruitment

Our working practices aim to respect and uphold all human rights for our employees and contractors working at our offices. We aim to ensure we are always compliant with employment legislation.

WSMA is aware that having robust recruitment procedures is an important part of combating slavery and human trafficking incidents within the UK. To address this, WSMA uses, amongst other background checks, pre-employment residency checks to ensure the legitimacy of its employees’ right to work in the UK. In relation to working conditions of its employees, WSMA has a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee that works on initiatives to ensure its employees experience a progressive environment of inclusion. To measure the success of such initiatives, WSMA fosters a culture of feedback from its employees in the form of regular culture surveys to ensure it is meeting the workplace culture expectations of its workforce.

Training

WSMA issues training to its employees on whistleblowing on an annual basis to ensure they are abreast of the procedures and avenues to report any serious breaches of laws they encounter in their employment with WSMA.

The WSMA Legal & Compliance department is also available to all employees for queries or training in relation to any of its policies and processes associated with detecting and mitigating against the risk that WSMA or its suppliers breach any modern slavery laws.

Risk Management

We maintain a risk-based approach to assess the likelihood of the existence of Modern Slavery in our supply chains, and, if an issue should be identified, we are committed to, where appropriate, working collaboratively with suppliers to fully eradicate any instance of Modern Slavery, and in doing so, seek to adopt an approach that produces the safest outcome for potential victims.

Supplier adherence to our values and ethics

We have zero tolerance to slavery and human trafficking. To ensure all those in our supply chain and contractors comply with our values and ethics, we have in place a dedicated compliance team that consists of involvement from the following departments:

Audit
Legal and compliance
Human resources

Our effectiveness in combating slavery and human trafficking

We are committed to maintaining high standards of conduct by our suppliers and have no tolerance for slavery or human trafficking in our business or supply chains. Although no specific slavery or human trafficking has been identified or reported in the last financial year, we will continue to monitor our business and supply chain to ensure slavery and human trafficking is not occurring.

Concluding Statement

Ethical behaviour is at the heart of our business. We do not use persons held in modern day slavery, nor accept the use of them by any of our suppliers. This includes people who have been trafficked, forced into labour, bonded into labour and those people held in servitude through financial control or control of their freedom of movement.

This statement has been published in respect of the financial year ending 31 December 2023 and will be reviewed and updated annually.

Modern Slavery Statement