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THE Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (Irda) has extended the guidelines for individual agents of life insurance companies to non-life insurers as well.
In an order issued on Tuesday, Irda asked non-life insurers to set a minimum benchmark for performance of their individual agents and barred them from appointing any blood relatives of employees as agents.
In a set of guidelines issued last Friday, the insurance regulator had asked all life insurance agents to maintain a minimum 50 per cent persistency ratio for the next three years and 75 per cent after financial year 2014-15. It also barred life insurers from offering licences to relatives of their employees as agents.
The same norms have
now been extended to nonlife insurers in a slightly modified form.
Since the tenure of most general insurance products
is one year, the persistency ratio is not a major factor here. However, the minimum performance standard set by Irda will ensure only serious players will remain in the industry.
The new guidelines are an extension of the Irda norms on health insurance portability, which was announced last week. With both these guidelines coming into effect from July 1, customers can expect better and reliable services from health insurers and their agents.
“These guidelines will infuse more accountability and professionalism in individual agents. Similar guidelines issued by Life Insurance Corporation of India some 25 years back on the issuance of licences to employees’ relatives has been extremely beneficial in terms of better commitment of agents,” said GN Agarwal, chief actuary with Future Generali India Insurance.
Source :- mydigitalfc
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