2025-26 Annual Report

It was also a year of new beginnings and fond farewells. After more than 30 years, we said goodbye to our landmark site on Richmond Road, opening the doors to RAA City overlooking Hindmarsh Square and a purpose-built technical centre, RAA West on Port Road.

At the same time, we have increased even further our focus on returning value to members and our investment in the community. This means new technology and digital services, fuel discounts and other member benefits, and vital community and road safety programs.

Our overall financial result in FY26 was a loss of $18.9 million. The result reflects our substantial investment in a new technology platform, with an organisational restructure well underway to deliver great services to members more efficiently. Our core businesses continue to perform well, and our recapitalised balance sheet creates more opportunities to expand our products and services and give more back to members. Underpinning our transformation is a new operating model, which will be implemented in the first half of FY27, and has been designed to create long term financial sustainability for RAA.

Behind the numbers, our commitment to members is unwavering. Through the year, RAA Insurance protected more than 636,000 homes and vehicles, and when things went wrong, members received $426 million in claims support to get them back on their feet. Our Patrols attended almost 355,000 breakdowns, and RAA Towing, just two years from launch, handled almost a third of the tows we provided in metropolitan Adelaide. And RAA Travel helped members take off on more than 45,000 holidays, supporting nearly 1,000 members whose travel was disrupted by conflict in the Middle East. RAA Charge, the state’s first border-to-border EV charging network, continued to play an important role in the energy transition, alongside our work helping thousands more South Australian households generate and store their own energy.

Not every decision this year was one we had hoped to make. We launched RAA Energy in 2024 to give members access to electricity usage rates without the retail mark-up. When a change of ownership of our retail partner meant we could no longer honour that, we closed RAA Energy, with existing customer pricing held until June 2027. 

We did some of our most rewarding work with the community organisations close to the hearts of our members. Through the Community Impact Fund, we supported road crash rescue training with the CFS Foundation, food relief with Foodbank SA and NT, education for Aboriginal students through Tjindu Foundation, aeromedical training with the Royal Flying Doctor Service and support for women through Catherine House.

Members told us congestion, fuel prices and road safety mattered most, so that is where we pressed hardest. Our 'Growth without Gridlock' agenda helped secure government commitments on rail, public transport and permanent real-time fuel pricing, now saving South Australians around $58 million a year. We also brought experts together to inform our push for stronger laws on e-scooters and e-bikes.

South Australia is changing, and our job is to change with it, as we have since 1903. Our new strategy, ‘From Transition to Transformation’, sets RAA up for an exciting future with opportunities to invest in ventures, products and services that deliver even more value to members. This means extending RAA benefits into more everyday moments and making sure every South Australian can access what we offer, staying true to our mutual values.

We are grateful to our members for their loyalty and for holding us to our purpose: to make life better for members and better for our community. A record number joined us at our 2025 Annual General Meeting to do precisely that. Our thanks go equally to our Board for steering us through significant change and to our people, who continue to show up for each other and for the more than 840,000 members we’re here for.

Kathy Gramp, Chair of the Board 
Nick Reade, Chief Executive Officer

Answering the call

We handled more than 870,000 calls for roadside assistance this year, attending almost 355,000 breakdowns and resolving many more over the phone. Also, 62,000 requests for roadside assistance came through our RAA app, where members could track their Patrol along the way. Overall, our road service delivery achieved 96.6% member satisfaction throughout the year.

Our automotive team replaced 69,870 batteries, carried out 6,885 vehicle inspections and completed 3,111 child restraint consults. We delivered 8,118 driving lessons, and our Car Advice team saved members $184,689 negotiating on repairs, warranties and used car purchases.

Two years from launch, RAA Towing completed 13,338 metro tows, almost a third of the tows we provided to members in metropolitan Adelaide. In May 2026 it reached full strength for the first time, with 14 drivers across eight trucks, achieving 95% member satisfaction. We also strengthened our regional coverage, appointing new RAA Road Service contractors in Yankalilla, Port Lincoln and Ardrossan and opening a battery hub in Port Augusta, so members breaking down in the state’s far north and west can be back on the road sooner.

Award-winning cover

RAA Insurance protected 466,037 vehicles, with members receiving $328 million in claims support during the year.

RAA Insurance was named Best for Member Benefits (SA) in the 2026 WeMoney Car Insurance Awards and also won six Finder Customer Satisfaction Awards including Most Trusted, Top Value and Legendary Service.

Ready for the road ahead

We kept building member confidence in the shift to electric vehicles, introducing EV battery health assessments and training our Patrols and approved repairers in EV and hybrid technology.

The state’s first border-to-border EV charging network RAA Charge had its biggest year yet, with 164,048 charging sessions, up almost 40%, and enough energy delivered to power 28 million kilometres of EV travel across the state. That's around 2.2 million litres of petrol motorists didn't need to buy, in a year when pump prices hit record highs.

Following the introduction of a 10% discount^, the number of members using RAA Charge grew by 77%. The network grew to 156 sites, to cater for the growing number of South Australians making the switch to electric.

The largest and most accessible charging network in the state, RAA Charge won the 2025 SA Premier's Award for Energy and Mining and the Australian Institute of Energy's SA Energy Project of the Year.

Getting members away

RAA Travel booked 45,919 trips and arranged cover for 49,494 holidays through our travel insurance underwritten by Tokio Marine.

When global conflict disrupted routes and unsettled plans, we were there. Almost 1,000 members were caught up in disruption in the Middle East, and our travel experts worked through rebookings, rerouting and refunds to get them where they needed to be.

A world of offers

A record 3,642 members came to our Travel Showcase, where more than 30 exhibitors offering expert sessions on Europe, Asia, New Zealand and outback Australia helped them plan their next trip.

Our Preferred Partnership program provided members with more than 80 exclusive new deals across cruising, touring and accommodation.

Because we’re South Australian, we back South Australians.

We launched a $5 million Community Impact Fund, so we could get behind programs that keep South Australians safer and stronger.

Members told us road safety was where our support is needed, and we’re also looking after organisations that help South Australians doing it tough.

Prioritising road safety

We expanded our support for the CFS Foundation, funding 68 road crash rescue training sessions for volunteers.

We launched a partnership with the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS), funding the aeromedical simulator its crews train on before they fly to crashes hundreds of kilometres from the nearest hospital. In 2025, the RFDS carried out 146 patient transfers in South Australia following crashes.

With Catherine House, South Australia's only homelessness and recovery service for women, we're funding crisis accommodation and helping hundreds of women a year work towards a driver's licence through driving lessons, car care workshops, vehicle inspections and registration support.

Backing stronger communities

Through our food drive with Foodbank SA & NT we helped distribute 14,500 meals to South Australians who would have otherwise gone hungry.

The RAA Foodbank Mobile Food Hub also helped 34,798 South Australians and we extended our support to establish a new mobile food hub to help families on the Eyre Peninsula.

We also increased our funding for the Tjindu Foundation, which helps First Nations students succeed at school through cultural education, helping their Year 12 students successfully complete their South Australian Certificate of Education (SACE).

33 not-for-profit organisations and 21 regional safety projects across the state were funded through our grant programs, supporting causes from child welfare and road safety to wildlife rescue.

'Growth without Gridlock'

With Adelaide growing and congestion among members' top concerns, we used the state election to press for better long-term transport planning. Our ‘Growth without Gridlock’ agenda set out more than 30 policies across infrastructure, transport, fuel affordability and sustainable growth. The campaign reached more than 430,000 people with almost 30,000 engagements on social media during the election alone.

Our advocacy effort helped secure a commitment from the state government to plan a northern rail extension and expand the metroCARD to Murray Bridge, while keeping the state's $2.1 billion road maintenance backlog in the spotlight.

Fuel affordability and electrification

With conflict in the Middle East driving record prices and shortages, we worked closely with the state government on fuel pricing transparency, securing ongoing funding for the real-time fuel pricing scheme and achieving endorsement of RAA’s fuel pricing app as the state’s primary source of fuel pricing and availability.

As prices spiked, more motorists moved to electrified models. Members told us through surveys what they needed to make the switch, and we took that to government, pressing for more public EV charging infrastructure.

e-scooter and e-bike safety

With our research showing eight in ten members unclear on the laws governing e-scooters and e-bikes, we launched ‘Don't bury your head in the footpath’ during National Road Safety Week, setting out the rules in plain terms for riders and parents. We convened road safety, health, local government and law enforcement experts to shape our submission to the state's review of e-mobility laws.

Fixing unsafe roads

Road safety runs through everything we do, and nowhere more directly than on the roads members drive every day. Our road safety team travelled more than 11,000 kilometres investigating South Australia’s regional roads, completing 40 road assessments, releasing 26 reports and making six submissions.

Our Report-a-Road program received 271 nominations, resulting in maintenance and safety issues across state and local road networks being fixed.

We reviewed regional roads in the mid-north and the Limestone Coast, and assessed the Port Wakefield Highway, an important corridor serving the growing population north of Adelaide.

We held Community Road Safety forums in Nuriootpa, Kadina and Mount Gambier to hear directly from the people who drive those roads.

Our advocacy and crash-data analysis contributed to the long-awaited release of Australian Road Assessment Program (AusRAP) star ratings for South Australia’s roads to help prioritise investment where it’s needed most.