Watchdog Critical Illness Insurance Report
Posted by: Jason King
April 16th, 2007.
A recent edition of BBC’s Watchdog programme featured a report on critical illness insurance and two claims that had unfortunately been declined. This is an emotional issue and one that I believe insurers need to get better at handling. However, what this report fails to highlight is that the vast majority of critical illness claims are actually paid.
The insurance industry has become more transparent in recent years. The only reason we know that 80% of claims are paid is because the industry voluntarily releases this information. Whilst we cannot be certain, I am confident that this is a better ratio than with other insurance products and you could include some home and motor insurance policies in this statement.
However this doesn’t mean that the critical illness insurance industry should rest on its laurels. We must do more to ensure that consumers are treated fairly when it comes to claims and that the importance of non-disclosure is highlighted. It is impossible to decide if the cases highlighted by Watchdog were treated fairly as more information is clearly required. However, one case seems to involve inadvertent non-disclosure of an unrelated medical condition. At present this is a valid reason to decline a claim and is in line with the Association of British Insurers (ABI) guidelines. We believe this is wrong and have campaigned for change for some time. It is time for the ABI to act.
If you have any questions please get in touch with us at 0800 068 5043.
To view the full report visit the BBC Watchdog site.
This entry was posted on Monday, April 16th, 2007 at 3:40 pm and is filed under Life Insurance.
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