Insurable Interest Canadian Insurance Blog

Melissa Dunne | October 26, 2020 While pension plan sponsors and the government have roles to play when it comes to retirement, it’s increasingly up to individual employees to ensure they have a solid retirement plan, said Jack Mintz, the president’s fellow at the University of Calgary’s school of public policy. During a virtual roundtable hosted by the Association of Canadian Pension Management on Thursday, he noted the shift away from defined benefit pensions to defined contribution plans means the onus is increasingly on the employee to make sure they don’t run out of money once they reach retirement. And with Canadians living and likely working longer, it’s time for government policy to reflect this change. Read: Retirement age rising for millennials, gen X and boomers: report “We’ve had a number of tax rules and pension rules based on the age of 65 and that made a lot of sense years ago, but the issue is now, once you hit 65, you can live to 87 or even longer. “I think we need to allow people to put more money in tax-sheltered savings. I would like to see an increase in pension limits and [tax-free savings account] limits in order to help people save more for...

The Patented Medicines Review Board (PMPRB) has unveiled the final version of the PMPRB guidelines, which have come after five years of work devoted to strengthen the Canadian framework governing patented drug prices. Updated after Health Canada’s August 2019 amendment to the Patented Medicines Regulations, the new guidelines include changes following two successive rounds of consultations. The PMPRB received comments from a broad spectrum of stakeholders including pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms, trade associations, public agencies, federal and provincial health authorities, private insurers, patients, and patient advocacy groups, among others. Under the new guidelines, the PMPRB said, it will compare Canadian list prices with those in Australia, Belgium, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, the UK, Sweden, France, the UK and Italy. The new guidelines also include an initial screening process to determine which drugs are likely to face higher risks of excessive pricing (“Category I” medicines), particularly those that come with high annual treatment costs or are expected to take hold of a sizeable share of the Canadian market. Those products, the PMPRB said, will be the ones it will focus its new powers on. Following the announcement, the Canadian Life and Health Insurance Association (CLHIA) issued a statement welcoming the new...

Richmond Times-Dispatch (VA) Kiplinger’s Personal Finance The pandemic’s effect on seniors has brought renewed attention to long-term care insurance – and aging at home. When policies first became widely available in the late 1970s, it was primarily used to help pay the costs of nursing homes. That has changed. Almost any policy sold now will have a pool of benefits that help pay for home care, a nursing home, assisted care, a memory unit or something similar, said Barbara Franklin, founder of Franklin & Associates, long-term care insurance brokers. You can typically collect long-term care insurance – and stop paying your premiums – once you have a recognized cognitive impairment or can’t do two of six “activities of daily living,” such as bathing or dressing. Advertisement The nature of your benefits will depend on your contract, but here are a few provisions to look for in a long-term care policy with an eye toward aging at home. Does the policy pay for informal caregiving? Many policies won’t pay for caregivers unless they come through licensed agencies, which often require you to pay for a minimum of three to four hours of care a day, Franklin said. But some policies cover...

Staff | October 23, 2020 Many Canadians are seeing the impact of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic on their retirement plans and ability to save, according to a new survey by the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. In the survey, 40 per cent of respondents expressed concerns about the pandemic’s effects on their savings, with 23 per cent unable to contribute to a nest egg since mid-March. Of those who couldn’t set aside any savings, 26 per cent were between the ages of 34 and 55, while 20 per cent were 56 or older. Read: Should early access to retirement funds be allowed due to coronavirus? In addition to finances, 32 per cent of respondents said they’ll travel less than planned or not at all in retirement, while many expect to work past retirement age, either due to a pandemic-related loss of income (30 per cent) or to cover increased costs (26 per cent). Another 40 per cent said they’ve delayed plans to downsize their primary residence. The survey also found 68 per cent of men and 57 per cent of women felt confident about managing investments in retirement. Women were also more likely to turn to friends and family for retirement advice (25...

Staff  | October 23, 2020 The Patented Medicine Prices Review Board published its new guidelines on Friday. The guidelines, which will take effect on Jan. 1, 2021, aim to modernize Canada’s pricing framework for patented medicines. They explain the steps that will typically be taken by the PMPRB’s staff in assessing whether a patented medicine appears to be priced excessively in Canada. The guidelines also explain what information patent-holding pharmaceutical companies must provide to the PMPRB to enable that assessment. Read: PMPRB publishes new draft guidelines, launches 30-day consultation The publication is the result of a lengthy process, including a series of consultations and the work of a multi-stakeholder steering committee on modernizing the guidelines. This summer, the PMPRB published its draft guidelines and announced the six-month postponement of the new guidelines. “The PMPRB would like to acknowledge and thank the thousands of Canadians who shared their thoughts and perspectives on the modernization of its regulatory framework over the entirety of this five-year period and, in particular, those who took the time to submit their views in writing,” said the PMPRB. “As noted, a number of important changes were made to the guidelines as a result of stakeholder feedback, the most recent of which differentiate the...

Stamford, CT (Oct. 19, 2020) – Gartner, Inc. has announced the top strategic technology trends that organizations need to explore in 2021. Analysts presented their findings during the virtual Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo Americas. “The need for operational resiliency across enterprise functions has never been greater,” said Brian Burke, research vice president at Gartner. “CIOs are striving to adapt to changing conditions to compose the future business. This requires the organizational plasticity to form and reform dynamically. Gartner’s top strategic technology trends for 2021 enable that plasticity. “As organizations journey from responding to the COVID-19 crisis to driving growth, they must focus on the three main areas that form the themes of this year’s trends: people centricity, location independence and resilient delivery. Taken together, these trends create a whole that is larger than its individual parts and focus on social and personal demand from anywhere to achieve optimal delivery.” The top strategic technology trends for 2021 are: Internet of Behaviors The internet of behaviors (IoB) is emerging as many technologies capture and use the “digital dust” of peoples’ daily lives. The IoB combines existing technologies that focus on the individual directly – facial recognition, location tracking and big data for example...

Toronto, ON (Oct. 22, 2020) – CSIO is pleased to announce the launch of the INNOTECH API Security Working Group. The kickoff session was held on October 21, with participants from six carriers, as well as representation from IBAC. The INNOTECH Advisory Committee is an industry initiative created to drive digital innovation and ultimately improve customer experiences within insurance by identifying major operational issues, common challenges, and solutions. Last month, the CSIO Board of Directors green lighted three digital solutions proposed by the INNOTECH Advisory Committee to solve common industry pain points, including standardized APIs. To move forward on the API initiative, the Committee formed an API Security Working Group of industry subject matter experts, to assess what a centralized security model would look like for members, including sourcing service providers. The group’s mandate is to develop industry specifications to implement a common authentication and authorization security solution to facilitate data exchange between insurers, brokers and third-party service providers using standardized APIs. In its initial session, the Working Group reached consensus on the initiative’s scope and deliverables. Moving forward, the team will meet to identify and determine security requirements and develop a solution recommendation to present to the CSIO Board....

45525534 – businessman doing yoga. vector flat illustration Melissa Dunne | October 23, 2020 At Benefits Canada‘s 2020 Workplace Benefits Awards on Oct. 16, Ericsson was recognized for its comprehensive health and wellness program that helps employees address their physical, mental and social health needs. “We’ve really focused on a health and wellness program that would benefits employee’s health and overall well-being. . . . I think, for us, it’s always been important. We’ve had an e-health and wellness program in Canada since 2016,” says Laura Glenn, wellness program manager for North America at Ericsson. “It’s definitely integral to our overall total rewards platform, which is something that employees are looking for more and more, . . . is to have an employer that offers comprehensive benefits and that cares for their well-being.” Read: Who are the winners of the 2020 Workplace Benefits Awards? The program offers employees a digital health and wellness platform and app, delivered in both English and French. Options for employees include online yoga class, tracking workouts with a fitness device and chatting virtually with colleagues about health and wellness. Over the past four years, the global telecommunications company has also offered many in-person wellness-focused options, including wireless health stations to monitor blood pressure and weight,...

Yaelle Gang | October 23, 2020 When the coronavirus pandemic hit, many organizations were focused on getting through the short term, but defined benefit pension plan sponsors are starting to take another look at de-risking. As of the second quarter of 2020, the total market volume of group annuity purchases year-to-date was $0.5 billion, compared to $1.5 billion in the first two quarters of 2019, according to the Willis Towers Watson annuity purchase index. The $1 billion drop in annuity purchases can be tied to the fact that plan sponsors were focused on their core business when the pandemic arrived and pension funding levels were on a roller-coaster ride, says Brent Simmons, head of DB solutions at Sun Life Canada. “I think those two factors contributed to a pretty slow start to the first half of the year.” Read: What options are available for de-risking DB pension plans? Yet, by the end of the third quarter, the market caught up to the same spot in terms of annuity sales from the previous year, he notes. “[As] at Sept. 30, 2019, the sales for the first nine months of the year were about $2.6 billion and we’re not that far off of that in 2020....

This year, the life insurance industry has made quick and crucial pivots as the global COVID-19 crisis accelerated certain long-standing trends. Over time, those trends will turn out to have a long-term impact on many areas – and that may include the relationship between Canadian wholesalers and independent insurance agents. Based on a survey conducted just before the global pandemic hit, a new report titled Redefining Wholesaling: The LIMRA-EY Canadian Wholesaler Study found that the predominant mode of communications among wholesalers and independent insurance agents was through in-person, face-to-face interactions, with just 2% of wholesalers meeting with independent agents via video conferencing. But as noted by Laura Murach, associate research director, Distribution Research at LIMRA: “Recognizing that face-to-face could include virtual as well as in person started prior to the pandemic, but shelter-in-place completed the process as virtual became the only option for face-to-face communication.” When asked to give reasons why independent insurance agents need an external wholesaler, half of wholesalers (49%) and 60% of independent insurance agents cited product expertise, making it the top factor. However, wholesalers also realized their effectiveness depends on going beyond product expertise with value-added services; that’s supported by 75% of independent insurance agents who...