Insurable Interest Canadian Insurance Blog

Equisoft announced on May 29 the launch of a targeted email marketing platform for financial advisors, developed in collaboration with Humania Assurance to promote the insurer’s 5575 product. The platform integrates directly with Kronos Finance, a Customer Relationship Management software (CRM). It can be activated and used by the advisor directly in the CRM, on an opt-in basis. Launched in November, Humania Assurance’s 5575 is a web–based critical illness insurance product for Canadians aged 55 and 75. “This collaboration with Equisoft is truly in line with our strategy to leverage interactive and intelligent technologies to provide advisors and their clients with innovative, simple and effective solutions,” said Stéphane Rochon, President and Chief Executive Officer at Humania Assurance. “By activating the tool, the advisor has access to a state-of the-art platform that is automatically populated with customer data, and can launch, in just a few clicks, an email campaign based on their target client profile.” Puts advisor at the center of the transaction “This new integration between Equisoft’s CRM platform and Humania’s eApp software is one of the first prospect-to-policy and direct-to-consumer technology integrations that puts the advisor at the center of the purchase transaction,” said François Levasseur, Senior Vice President,...

Rapid embrace of marketplace trends, digital technologies is intensifying the demand for a new digital era of insurance Morristown, NJ (May 28, 2019) – Majesco, a global leader of cloud insurance software solutions for insurance business transformation, has announced the release of new primary research report, Building the Business Model for the Next Generation of Small-Medium Business Leaders, based on its third annual survey of small-medium business owners (SMBs) who make or influence insurance purchase decisions for their companies. The report underscores shifts in behaviors and expectations of the SMB market that demand insurers to rethink their business to retain their customer base and capture growth opportunities emerging for a growing and underserved market of over 30 million SMBs, which comprise over 99% of all businesses in the U.S. “Embracement of digital technologies, new SMB market opportunities and the generational shift and influence of Millennials and Gen Z are rapidly redefining how insurers must engage and respond,” commented Denise Garth, SVP of Strategic Marketing, Industry Relations and Innovation at Majesco. “Over the next 7 years, Millennials and Gen Z will become the dominant owners and influencers in the SMB market as they launch new startups and take over the helm...

AI-powered solution enables carriers to boost quoting capacity by 50% and respond to submissions in seconds Toronto, ON (May 29, 2019) – Chisel AI, a technology provider for the global insurance industry, today announced Submission Triage, an AI-powered intelligent workflow that enables commercial insurance carriers to auto-route and auto-decline submissions, dramatically expanding their quoting and underwriting capacity without adding staff. Chisel AI unveiled the solution at the Dig|In 2019 insurance technology conference in Austin. “Everything is now one click away,” said Ron Glozman, CEO and Founder, Chisel AI. “Customers expect immediate responses and more than 50% of the time the first responder to a submission wins the business. Our Submission Triage solution helps carriers increase initial response rates from 40% to nearly 100% while boosting their quoting capacity by 50%. By automating the process, carriers can quote thousands of submissions per day, and issue responses in seconds.” “When shopping for coverage, today’s tech-savvy, digitally-empowered customers expect the same quick and painless experience in their working lives as they’re used to in their personal lives,” said Mike Fitzgerald, Senior Analyst at Celent. “By automating cumbersome back-office processes, solutions like Chisel AI’s Submission Triage show great promise in helping carriers increase their...

Bakersfield Californian, The (CA) After months of delays, the murder trial of former elementary school principal Leslie Chance is about to get underway. Chance, 52, is accused of shooting her husband to death in August 2013, and leaving his body near a commercial orchard several miles northwest of Bakersfield. According to a source at Kern County Superior Court, Judge Charles R. Brehmer laid out a tentative schedule Tuesday for the trial, which is expected to last well into August. Beginning Thursday, the court will hear motions in limine, a Latin term referring to motions made before a trial begins. These motions seek to avoid having the jury tainted by irrelevant, inadmissible, or prejudicial evidence. These limine motions may last three or four weeks. “You don’t want to pick a jury until the limine motions are complete — until you know the shape of the evidence,” said longtime Bakersfield attorney Kyle Humphrey, who is not involved in the Chance case. Judge Brehmer, Humphrey said, is efficient at moving through such proceedings. Jury selection is set to begin in late June. The goal is to have a jury chosen before the Fourth of July holiday. Opening statements are tentatively scheduled to begin...

PR Newswire Over the 30 years he’s worked with people who are trying to squeeze all of the juice out of their retirement savings, Scott Page says he’s been surprised that most of them leave a key element out of the equation. His solution was to create a life expectancy calculator that makes it easy and fun to get an estimate of just how long you are going to need your retirement funds to last. “You would not budget for a trip without knowing how long it would be or how you’d get there,” says Page, who is now the CEO of LifeGuide Partners, an educational resource for seniors and others searching for additional ways to fund retirement. “But that’s what a lot of folks are doing when they save for retirement. I wanted to help them gain a better perspective on their longevity, but do it in an approachable way that’s informative, maybe a bit humorous and even reflective.” Having long worked in and around life insurance, Page’s approach to the longevity calculator includes lifestyle factors someone completing the calculation can manipulate, getting an idea for how changes they make now may affect how long and how well they live. He worked with...

An RBC insurance survey has uncovered a worrying trend – as the number of Canadians who need time off work rises, disability coverage continues to decline. RBC reported that the majority of working Canadians (68%) have some experience with time off work due to a disability, whether for themselves or a family member, or they know someone who has taken a disability leave. However, the study also found that 50% of working Canadians said they would have liked to have taken time off work for a disability but felt they couldn’t afford it; a statistic that is up five points from 2018. Despite the increase, the number of Canadians who have disability coverage either through their workplace benefits or personal insurance that they’ve purchased declined by five points from 55% in 2018, leaving half of working Canadians without any disability coverage at all. “It’s troublesome to see an inverse trend between the number of Canadians who need to take time off for a disability, and those who have the coverage in place – or the finances – to do so,” says Maria Winslow, senior director, Life & Health, RBC Insurance. “With half of the working population without disability coverage, many...

While insurers and employers agree on the legitimacy and seriousness of mental health issues, those who suffer from such conditions still face challenges in getting their claims approved. “Insurance companies are, for the most part, keenly aware of the need for mental health-related benefits in the workplace and have become significantly better at handling such claims,” reported Global News, citing unnamed sources. “But insurers are also under pressure to keep costs under control and continue to rely on standards and processes that don’t always fit with the realities of mental health illnesses.” The most obvious problem, according to Toronto employment lawyer Andrew Monkhouse, is the fact that mental illness is less visible than physical ailments. Medical evidence for mental conditions is not as clear-cut as results from a laboratory test; aside from that, there has to be proof that an illness is severe enough to disrupt someone’s job performance. Lawyers like Monkhouse agree that a general practitioner’s opinion isn’t always enough to sway insurers into accepting a disability claim. They’re more likely to accept one from a specialist — though seeing one can take up to 18 months for Canadians. HR consultant Julie Holden, who has 15 years of experience...

British Columbia is expanding its use of biosimilars to open up opportunities for new drug listings and boost existing coverage for patients, the province announced on Monday. “B.C. is leading the country by promoting the widespread use of biosimilars, which have been proven to work just as safely and effectively as higher priced biologics,” said BC Minister of Health Adrian Dix. “To date, Canada is far behind European jurisdictions. Biosimilars are a necessary step to ensure PharmaCare provides existing coverage for more people and funds new drugs well into the future.” According to the statement from the province, there’s clear evidence supporting the use of biosimilars that can cost from 25% to 50% less than their biologic analogs. Despite this, Canada has a significantly lower use rate (8%) than what is seen among other nations (50% to 95%). “In 2018, B.C. spent $125 million on Lantus, Enbrel and Remicade, three biologic drugs that treat chronic conditions such as diabetes, arthritis and Crohn’s disease,” the statement said, noting that they made up the single biggest expense for public drug plan — and the costs are still climbing. Following the announcement, around 20,400 British Columbians living with ankylosing spondylitis, diabetes, plaque psoriasis,...

The number of Canadians who need time off work due to a disability is on the rise, yet disability coverage continues to decline, found an RBC Insurance survey. The study found that 50% of working Canadians would have liked to have taken time off work for a disability but felt they couldn’t afford it, up 5 points from RBC Insurance’s 2018 survey on disability. Despite the increase, the number of Canadians who have disability coverage either through their workplace benefits or personal insurance that they’ve purchased declined by 5 points from 55 per cent in 2018. This leaves half of working Canadians without any disability coverage at all, underlines RBC Insurance. “It’s troublesome to see an inverse trend between the number of Canadians who need to take time off for a disability, and those who have the coverage in place – or the finances – to do so,” said Maria Winslow, Senior Director, Life & Health, RBC Insurance. “With half of the working population without disability coverage, many Canadians are exposing themselves to financial risk.” Serious financial implications When faced with the possibility of becoming disabled and unable to work for three months, 67% of working Canadians surveyed agreed there would...

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners creates model laws for states to pass. Re-opening the contentious life insurance illustrations model regulation is on the table, state insurance regulators said today, but the group is starting with a narrow look at issues with AG 49. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ subgroup held an at-times contentious conference call to set an agenda for its work. Fred Anderson, acting deputy commissioner of insurance for Minnesota, put forth 23 options, separated into two groups: disclosure-related and beyond disclosure. The list included re-opening the Life Insurance Illustrations Model Regulation, which would require approval from the NAIC A Committee. The original regulation was debated for years before gaining approval. The regulators settled on accepting comments on these four options from the “beyond disclosure” list: An NAIC subgroup is accepting comments on these four options, represented in the left-hand column. The right-side column includes more details on the issue. ‘Juicing The Illustrations’ Actuarial Guideline 49 was developed in 2015 to provide insurance carriers a more uniform method for calculating maximum illustrated rates on IUL products and to help consumers better understand index life insurance product illustrations. AG 49 states that: “If an insurer engages in a...