About

The legal team at MAPFRE Turkey expertly handles the legal affairs of both the MAPFRE Sigorta and MAPFRE Yaşam Sigorta companies (“Mapfre Turkey Companies”). Merve Öney is the legal affairs director and head of compliance of both companies as well as the general secretary of the board of directors and a member of the executive committee. Within the team there are six lawyers and four support staff members. The department is split into four sub-teams; litigation, legal operations, corporate and advisory and compliance with litigation and operations having four and three lawyers respectively, as well as a specialist lawyer handling corporate and compliance. The litigation sub-department focuses on all types of litigation and dispute resolution such as opposition cases and execution proceedings, consumer arbitration commission applications and lawsuits and queries relating to insurance law raised by the other departments in the company. The litigation department also supervises the external counsels providing legal support. The legal operations sub-department is in charge of legal payments, external counsel office audits, legal reserves reporting and expenses of the department. Corporate and advisory is responsible from agreement reviews, general assembly meetings, board of directors meetings, governmental body correspondences and non-insurance law related queries raised by other departments within the company. The compliance sub-department monitors whether the company abides the legislation in force, foresees any possible risks and aims to minimise the same. The sub-department also coordinates publication of MAPFRE Group policies. Recently, the team has been restructuring its department policy on external counsel, employing more strategic usage to efficiently handle litigation and other matters in regional areas. This structure has proven helpful in ensuring the department performs at its highest standard. As highlighted by Öney, the team’s culture is ‘to become a multinational team working constantly to improve our services, and develop the best relationship with our clients, distributors, suppliers, shareholders and society at large’. She explains further adding: ‘In order to create this, we believe that a team fully committed [to] continuous development and training for the enhancement of the team’s capabilities and skills are the crucial elements to be taken into consideration. On top of this, of course, innovation, social responsibility, leadership and corporate ethics are of extreme importance as well’.