Insurable Interest Canadian Insurance Blog

Staff | May 19, 2020 The Home Depot Inc. has taken a number of steps to support its employees during the coronavirus pandemic. In its annual earnings report, the global home improvement retailer said it expanded paid time off for all hourly workers with additional hours to be used at their discretion, which will be paid out at year-end if not used. It also provided additional paid time off for associates aged 65 and older or deemed to be at higher risk. Hourly workers in its stores and distribution centres received weekly bonuses and double overtime pay. And it extended dependant care benefits and waived related co-pays on the benefits plan. Read: Amazon extending increased hourly pay through May As a result of the actions taken to support employees, the Home Depot incurred a total of about US$850 million of pre-tax expense, according to the report. “As the COVID-19 pandemic evolved, we anchored to the core values of our company by focusing on two key priorities: working to ensure the safety and well-being of our associates and customers and providing our customers and communities with essential products,” said Craig Menear, the company’s chairman, chief executive officer and president, in a press release. Read the full article at BenefitsCanada.com

Staff | May 19, 2020 The Alberta Investment Management Corp.’s board of directors has released a statement outlining its response to the poor performance of its volatility trading strategy. In the wake of the coronavirus crisis, the strategy resulted in a loss of $2.1 billion or about two per cent of the AIMCo’s portfolio. “Oversight of AIMCo’s investment strategies and risk management is the responsibility of the board of directors,” said the statement. “We deeply regret this result and are determined that the lessons from this experience will improve the corporation’s management processes and prevent any similar occurrences.” Read: AIMCo calls reports of losses on volatility strategy ‘dramatically’ overstated The board said its first priority is limiting the damage from the volatility trading strategy. It also confirmed that no other investment strategies it uses could “. . . generate substantial losses in very unusual circumstances.” The board is also undertaking a comprehensive third-party review of the volatility trading strategy to identify what lessons can be learned and how those lessons can be leveraged to enhance the AIMCo’s investment and risk management processes. The organization has tasked KPMG’s financial risk management team to perform an independent review and is calling on the expertise of Barbara Zvan, former chief risk and strategy...

Consumer behavior is shifting in favor of BigTech insurance providers as customers feel empowered to forego agents and brokers and work directly with new entrants Paris (May 14, 2020) – The Capgemini Efma World Insurance Report 2020 reveals that consumers of all ages are adopting a ‘millennial mindset’, and increasingly trusting their own research through various channels to source information and purchase insurance products themselves. Consumers are turning to non-traditional players including BigTechs (large, multinational technology firms such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Alibaba, etc.) and product manufacturers for innovative, personalized offerings with enhanced customer experience (CX) and are increasingly relying on digital channels in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. To remain relevant, cites the report, incumbent insurers must take action, by re-evaluating their portfolios and harnessing partnerships to become ‘Inventive Insurers’. This involves shaping existing products to meet fast-evolving customer needs and preferences. The millennial mindset has transcended age Digital adoption is no longer a function of age; for those with access to the web and social media, researching and directly procuring insurance online has become mainstream across all generations. Capgemini’s report shows that the number of Gen X and older customers (born in 1980 or earlier) making...

Courtesy of LIMRA LIMRA reached out to U.S. and Canadian agency-building companies regarding their recruiting efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic crisis and the challenges and strategies around it. All of the companies surveyed are still recruiting agents. Despite the challenges with getting newer agents licensed, 65% of companies are not focusing on more experienced agents. To compensate for social distancing guidelines, most companies are using virtual platforms such as Zoom to engage with candidates. Companies are training and sourcing candidates in both new and traditional ways. They’re currently using more virtual conferencing, telephone interviews, and virtual classrooms, while also continuing to use traditional methods like Zip Recruiter, LinkedIn, and Indeed. In some cases, companies have had to delay the start dates for inexperienced agents who still needed to pass exams in order to sell insurance. Most companies, however, have continued to onboard new recruits. Advertisement “Some states have allowed for temporary licenses and companies are taking advantage of this,” says Margaret Honan, assistant research director, LIMRA. “Others are continuing to have non-licensed candidates focus on studying in order to be ready to test once it’s possible.” When it comes to keeping business and recruiting going, many companies are looking at...

PR Newswire Today, The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America® (Guardian Life) unveiled a new feature of its Guardian Level Term life insurance, a built-in charitable benefit rider1. The term insurance product offers level pricing for the duration of the policy that helps create protection for families and the ability to create a charitable giving legacy. Nearly two-thirds of Americans have donated to charity over the last year2. Yet, being able to bequeath a donation to a charity is often perceived as reserved for the wealthy. Guardian Life’s Level Term with the built-in Charitable Benefit allows those who are charitable-minded to support their charity of choice upon their death. Term life provides a tax free payout for beneficiaries, while the charitable benefit feature provides a donation, 1% of the policy face amount (subject to a $100,000 maximum charitable donation), to the policy owner’s charity at no additional cost. There are three methods that are commonly suggested for charitable giving through insurance: naming the charity as a beneficiary, transferring dividends to a charity or donating an existing policy to a charity. Guardian Life’s Level Term life insurance introduces a new option – utilizing the built-in charitable giving feature to make a charitable...

The potential claims impact of increased death benefits from the COVID-19 pandemic on life insurers will be relatively small, Moody’s Investors Service reports. Recent first-quarter earnings calls of U.S. life insurers show there remains significant uncertainty around the amount of difference there will be between insured mortality and general mortality, Moody’s said. However, life insurers’ estimates are consistent with Moody’s view that death benefits paid out as a result of COVID-19 will be relatively small. Companies mainly downplayed the impact of a longevity risk offset, which was consistent with Moody’s  analysis that the benefits of longevity risk offset would be generally small. The following are comments that Moody’s compiled from life insurers’ first-quarter earnings calls. Advertisement Read the original article at insurancenewsnet.com

Staff | May 15, 2020 Amazon.com Inc. is extending its increased hourly pay for all global employees and its double overtime pay for employees in Canada and the U.S. through May 30. The pay increase, which began in April, is $2 an hour in Canada, US$2 in the U.S., £2 in the U.K. and about €2 in many European Union countries. The extensions increase the online retailer’s total investment in pay during the coronavirus to nearly $800 million for its hourly employees, according to a company blog post. Read: A refresher on Canada’s leave policies as coronavirus escalates In addition, Amazon said it’s providing flexibility with leave of absence options, including expanding its policy to cover coronavirus circumstances, such as high-risk individuals or school closures. In the company’s recent earnings release, chief executive officer Jeff Bezos said Amazon expects to spend $4 billion, and perhaps a bit more, on coronavirus-related expenses getting products to customers and keeping employees safe. “This includes investments in personal protective equipment, enhanced cleaning of our facilities, less efficient process paths that better allow for effective social distancing, higher wages for hourly teams and hundreds of millions to develop our own COVID-19 testing capabilities. There is a lot of uncertainty in the world right now, and the best investment...

Staff | May 15, 2020 The majority (93 per cent) of Canadian employers plan to favour a government-based approach when it comes to bringing their employees back to work, according to a new survey by Aon. The survey, which reached more than 500 Canadian organizations in late April, also found 82 per cent of respondents said they’ll stagger return to work by role prioritization, while 71 per cent said they’ll stagger it by geography or location. Upon employees’ return to the workplace, all survey respondents said they’ll implement temperature check sites hosted by trained staff, thermal cameras or on a self-reporting basis. Most companies said they’ll request that their employees complete a health assessment survey upon their return. Read: Legal considerations for employers as pandemic drags on “Although the humanitarian and economic toll of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to climb, many organizations are beginning to shift their focus from crisis management and business continuity to planning a safe return to work, amidst a new normal for business operations once stay-at-home regulations begin to relax,” said Rejean Tremblay, chief commercial officer at Aon, in a press release. “This survey shows that Canadian organizations are taking proactive steps to improve their workplace and ease the return to the...

UPDATE: At 1 p.m. today, LATF announced a public comment period on the Independent Proposal. Comments will be accepted until May 27 and can be sent to Reggie Mazyck at [email protected] **** A wide rift opened Thursday among industry and consumer factions over changes to indexed universal life illustration rules, with anti-trust charges lobbed at the American Council of Life Insurers. The acrimony dashed plans by state regulators to reach a consensus on language changes. Minnesota regulator Fred Anderson planned as chairman to use the 90-minute call by the Life Actuarial Task Force to forge ahead on new language to Actuarial Guideline 49. That language was submitted by ACLI. Advertisement That plan met immediate resistance from Bobby Samuelson, former insurance company executive, and Birny Birnbaum, executive director of the Center for Economic Justice. An NAIC-supported consumer advocate, Birnbaum expressed the concern that ACLI was “engaging in anti-trust violations because it was acting as a mechanism for insurers to collaborate on regulatory guidance directly related to product designs.” The ACLI said the anti-trust claim did not have merit and did not help the process. “Baseless claims contribute nothing to the important discussion of how best to help consumers make informed decisions...

Toronto, ON (May 12, 2020) – As Canadian provinces and their economies slowly begin to re-open, a survey on consumer attitudes towards use of healthcare services reveals hesitancy to return to pre-pandemic behaviour without a COVID-19 vaccine. It also reveals a rapidly increasing interest in virtual healthcare services that eliminate physical interaction between patient and health provider. In a survey of over 500 Green Shield Canada (GSC) health benefits plan members, a majority of respondents indicated a likelihood of them attending a normal visit to the dentist (62%) in the pre-vaccine period, but a full 25% indicated they would not. When it came to paramedical services such as physiotherapy, massage and chiropractic services, only a minority of respondents indicated an intention to attend in-person appointments in a pre-vaccine environment, even if needed – 34% for physiotherapy, 29% for massage and 28% for chiropractic care. “It was an interesting exercise to measure Canadians’ attitudes about attending medical appointments that would have given them no pause only a few months ago,” explains GSC’s Executive Vice President of Digital, Innovation and Brand Experience, David Willows. A majority of respondents – 61% – also expressed an expectation that healthcare professionals will greet them in...