Life insurers’ mixed market messages
Group life/risk has emerged as one of the few bright spots for insurers in the Dexx&r Life Analysis Report, with Individual Death, Total and Permanent Disablement (TPD) and Trauma sales all significantly down in the December quarter to levels not seen since 2012.
The life/risk sales data, released today, comes at the same time as the major life insurance companies face scrutiny by the Senate Economics References Committee and as the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) examines procedures amid suggestions that company profitability has impacted claim-handling.
The Dexx&r data showed that sales of Lump Sum Risk products in the December 2015 quarter totalled $303 million, which it said represented a decrease of 20 per cent when compared with the September 2015 quarter and a decrease of one per cent on the $306 million recorded in the December 2014 quarter.
It said that for the year to December, 2015, new annual premiums of $1.28 billion were down on the $1.3 billion recorded during 2014 and were at a similar level to new annual premiums recorded for the 12 months ending December 2012.
The analysis said that of the top 10 life companies only MLC, OnePath, TAL, Zurich and AIA recorded an increase in lump sum sales during 2015.
The better news came for insurers in terms of improving disability experience for those insurers in the group market, with total in-force Group Risk business increasing by 14 per cent to $6 billion over the 12 months to December 2015, up from $5.3 billion at December 2014.
The analysis said that over the year ending December 2015 all of the top 10 companies in the Group Risk market recorded increases in in-force group business with TAL regaining market leadership in the segment with a 27 per cent increase to $1.7 billion in in-force premiums following the insurer's appointment by Cbus.
It noted that the TAL Cbus mandate also elevated the status of reinsurer Pacific Life Re.
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