ING Life on ambitious growth plans

ING Life India has made a 5year growth plan expecting 5 times of customer growth totaling to 5Million. The company will add fresh capital of 2.4 bn in 2010-11 for the expansion. Mr. Tom McInerney, COO, ING Insurance said, ‘ING sees its Asia-Pacific businesses to lead the growth in insurance worldwide. Within ING Asia-Pacific, India is uniquely placed and a frontrunner of this growth. We have a huge opportunity in this market and we are committed to see this business grow’

Presently ING is having 55000 agents and a strong bancassurance partner, ING Vysya Bank. About the expansion Mr. Kshitij Jain, MD & CEO said that in the last 18 months they were focusing on strengthening their foundation. Now they are ready to enter the next phase of growth. Growth will happened from expansion of current distribution network and further building on productivity.

“India First” – First to obtain ISO certificate

IndiaFirst Life Insurance Co. is the first to receive the ISO 9001:2008 certificate. They got the certificate within 7 months of operations. Dr. Nandagopal, MD &CEO, IndiaFirst Life Insurance said, “The ISO certification is our first step towards ensuring that all our systems and processes are developed keeping our ‘Customers’ in mind. Through our QualityFirst initiative which starts with ISO 9001:2008 certification and continues through Six Sigma compliance, we plan to work towards reducing wastage, improving customer delight, and enhancing employee confidence thereby adding to our overall brand equity,” The certificate was awarded for all consumer related functions including underwriting, policy servicing, claims, risk & compliance, customer care etc.

IndiaFirst Life is the ‘youngest’ life insurance company with distribution network of 4500 branches of Bank of Baroda and Andhra Bank.

Best bonus from ING Life

ING Life announced annual bonus rates for all its participating products and Best years’ Retirement Plans for the fiscal year 2009 – 2010. The bonus rates are the best from the company so far. Mr. John Boers, CFO, ING Life said, “I am delighted to announce record bonus rates for our participating products, thus being able to reward our customers. The rates declared, especially on our retirement plan, ING Best Years and on our other traditional products such as ING New fulfilling life and ING Powering Life are the best so far. The declared bonus rates have been possible owing to our sharp focus of managing our business efficiently”.  Powering Life is a high end endowment product. The assured sum is paid on maturity alongwith accrued bonus or earlier on death of life assured and also has customised premium payment terms.

Best Years is a retirement plan assures capital guarantee provision and also protection of investment and return earned with added benefits to suit retirement needs.
ING Life is present throughout India in 229 cities with more than 50000 advisors. It offers varied products that help more than a million customers

Kotak Mahindra Insurance appoints new MD

Mr. Pankaj Desai has been appointed as MD of Kotak Mahindra Old Mutual Life Insurance Ltd. (Kotak Life Insurance). Mr. Desai, has been working with Kotak Mahindra group for more than a decade. Speaking of his priorities in the new role, Pankaj Desai, said, “My focus would be to build on the strong business franchise and goodwill we have created over the last ten years. We will work towards sustained value creation and efficient use of capital. Special emphasis will be placed on bettering the customer proposition, further cost reduction and better cost management, factors which in the past have stood us in good stead”. He joined Kotak Life as ED in 2006. He was assigned responsibility for Sales, Training, Distribution and Channel Marketing functions.

Pension fund Managers

Under the New Pension Scheme, 35 percent of the Pension fund has been allocated to LIC. There are three fund mangers, SBI Pension Fund, UTI retirement solutions and LIC PF.SBI PF has been allocated 33 per cent against 40 percent last year and UTI Retirement solutions has been allocated 32 per cent against 31 per cent last year. Funds are allocated to the fund managers by NPS trust based on their performance. Nine states have started contributing to the NPS other than Central Government.

Performance of Life Insurance sector in 1st quarter of year

In this fiscal year the life insurance industry grew more than 75 per cent in their new business collections in the first quarter. LIC’s new business premium showed 108 per cent and private sector showed 25 per cent growth in its new business. ICICI Prudential is the largest player followed by SBI Life among the private players. ICICI prulife grew by 74 percent and SBI Life fell 9 percent. All the Life insurance companies focus on pushing their unit-linked plans before the expected changes in product structures of ULIPs from 1st September. ULIP contribution is more than 80 per cent of the total business for the Industry.

IRDA’s terms on ULIPs

IRDA announced that if a ULIP holder wanted to discontinue the policy he has to pay upto Rs.6000/- based on the policy years one to four. The charges will range from Rs.1000 to Rs.6000 based on the premium paid by the ULIP holder. Policies discontinued from the fifth year will not carry discontinuation charges. IRDA said, "Where a policy is discontinued, only discontinuance charge may be levied by the insurer and no other charges by whatsoever name called shall be levied," only after completion of the lock-in period the proceeds would be refunded. The proceeds would include the fund value on the date of discontinuation along with interest computed with minimum interest rate of.3.5%.

After 30 days grace period the insurance companies has to send a notice to the discontinued policy holder within15 days from the expiry of the grace period. Within 30 days the policy holder has to respond to revive the policy. The holder can decide either to revive or completely withdraw from the policy without any risk cover.

Reliance Life plans IPO

Reliance life is reported to be looking out for strategic investors and to float IPO. This proposal is waiting for concerned regulators nod namely IRDA and SEBI. IRDA chairman stated that IPO guidelines for insurance companies have been finalized and referred to SEBI. Reliance life may be the first insurance company going in for IPO. Mr. Ghosh, President &E.D. of Reliance Life informed that their new premium for 1st Quarter 2010 was Rs.603 crores. This is a 20% increase on similar quarterly performance in last fiscal. Further Mr. Ghosh also told that in terms of policies the raise was 21% and 50% of them were traditional policies.

Life Insurers seek extra time on ULIPs regulations

IRDA has informed the life insurance companies to follow the new guidelines from September 1. The life insurance companies have requested for more time to comply with the new guidelines on ULIPs. They expect they would convince the regulator to leave some of the new rules in the extra time. They have also requested IRDA to allow them to offer pension plans without guaranteed returns or with attached health or life cover. The new guidelines compel insurance companies to provide a life or health cover with pension plans with guaranteed 4.5% return on all the pension products

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