NEW YORK--( BUSINESS WIRE )--On May 14, 2020, Kroll Bond Rating Agency (KBRA) assigned the following insurance financial strength ratings (IFSR) to the three insurance subsidiaries of United Heritage Financial Group, Inc. (UHFG): A- to United Heritage Life Insurance Company (UHLIC); A- to Sublimity Insurance Company (SIC); and BBB+ to United Heritage Property & Casualty Company (UHPC). The Outlook for all ratings is Stable. UHLIC’s rating reflects its strong capitalization, favorable operating performance, balanced reserve mix, and low-risk product profile. The company’s risk-adjusted capital and surplus-to-liabilities ratios exceed life industry averages. UHLIC has demonstrated steady...
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American credit rating firm Fitch Ratings has confirmed that the credit quality of UK non-life insurers could be affected by the impending court rulings on the validity of business interruption (BI) claims resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic. Its report, Coronavirus Impact: UK Non-Life Insurance, described policy wording for BI insurance as “crucial” and that “courts may rule in favour of claims in cases where policy wording is loose” – Fitch Ratings believes that BI and event cancellation claims are most likely to be the main cost of the pandemic to the UK non-life insurance sector. In this report, Fitch Ratings reviewed UK non-life insurers’ ratings, taking account of the pandemic, for...
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Spike in fraudulent death claims for 2017 The Association for Savings and Investment South Africa (ASISA) has released its consolidated statistics of fraudulent and dishonest claims for 2017 – and the figures indicate that South African life insurers foiled a total of 5 026 irregular claims to the value of R1.13bn in 2017. Although the total number of such claims across different types of long-term insurance products was lower than it was in 2016, when 13 488 claims (mostly funeral claims) proved to be irregular, the value was almost the same (R1.03bn). Meanwhile, life insurers made benefit payments of R469bn to policyholders and beneficiaries in the same year. More than R60bn was paid to...
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Insurance Premiums Fall by over 21% in Q1 2020 Luxembourg's Insurance Commission (Commissariat aux assurances) has reported a significant drop in inflows into the insurance sector for the first quarter of 2020. The first quarter saw insurance inflows fall significantly for the first time in a long time: all insurance branches combined, premiums fell by 21.31% compared to the same period in last year. According to the Insurance Commission, this drop in activity is not linked to the COVID-19 health crisis which appeared towards the end of the quarter. The evolution of activity diverged strongly according to the sectors: while the inflow of life insurance branches fell by 37.26% compared...
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Sun Life Financial’s CEO Dean Connor says Canada’s life insurers will continue to face challenging times for the remainder of the year as profit declined sharply in the company’s first quarter due to the coronavirus outbreak. On Tuesday, Canada’s second-largest insurer reported first-quarter net income of $391-million, or 67 cents a share, down from $623-million, or $1.04 a share, in 2019’s first quarter. The drop in net income for the quarter was mostly due to declines in equity markets, brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Mr. Connor, during the company’s annual general meeting Tuesday evening. “While it’s difficult to determine today how the business will be impacted by future...
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How Mobile Tech Changes the Face of Life Insurance By Insurance CIO Outlook | Wednesday, May 06, 2020 Life insurers have jumped heavily towards embracing mobile technology to meet the increasing demands of their consumers. FREMONT, CA: Mobile technology has become the dominant mechanism for web access, and life insurers are vigilantly investing in it to boost business. Mobile technology provides unparalleled channel access capability, extending from the internet to mobile applications and brings communication, anytime and anywhere, to the forefront. Here is how mobile technology benefits life insurers. A mobile app in life insurance opens the door for two-way communication. It also...
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Life insurers likely to offer health plans 'Non-life companies feel that allowing life insurers to offer health plans will increase the competition further in the market' At present a person can buy indemnity-based health plans from non-life insurers, including standalone health insurance companies. (iStock) Insurance regulator IRDAI will seek the views of both life and general insurance councils before taking a decision on allowing life insurance companies to offer health plans. “The life insurance companies are asking permission to offer indemnity-based health plans. We will be writing to the Life Insurance Council and the General Insurance Council in a week or so to seek their views on...
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Mumbai, December 22: There is a good news for life insurance industry. The 2018-19 annual report released by Insurance regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) shows the industry registered a double digit growth as opposed to the previous year. This growth in industry numbers not only comes as a good news for the industry but also highlights growing life cover and security for Indian citizens. According to the annual report, life insurance industry recorded a premium of Rs 5,08.132.03 crore during 2018-19 as against Rs 4, 58.809.44 crore in the previous financial year and registered growth of 10.75 per cent (9.64 per cent growth in previous year). During 2018-19, Life Insurance...
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A new research paper from Federal Reserve staffers finds U.S. life insurers have taken on the risks in private debt largely ceded by banks after the 2008 financial crisis. These insurers, who are sparsely regulated at the federal level, have deployed “complex on- and off-balance sheet arrangements” to deploy “vast amounts of annuity capital” investing in private debt, according to the paper. “Within ten years, the U.S. life insurance industry has grown into one of the largest private debt investor in the world,” says the paper written by Nathan Foley-Fisher, Nathan Heinrich and Stéphane Verani, all of whom work in the Fed’s research and statistics division. The authors find that retail and...
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Life insurers breached the industry’s own code of practice at least 315 times in just six months, a review of complaints has found. Most of the 11 insurers, which law firm Maurice Blackburn lodged complaints against in early 2018, then failed to respond to initial inquiries from the body overseeing the code, the Life Code Compliance Committee. In a scathing report issued on Wednesday, the committee said many insurance companies “lacked robust frameworks for monitoring compliance” with the code and slammed the industry for taking far too long to clean up its act, saying this was now “largely only occurring as a result of the review rather than the subscribers’ desire to ensure they comply...
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