Underwriting

Interested in offering clients additional products and services while enjoying the compensation that comes with it? How would you like to strengthen and secure your client relationship by helping the business retain and reward key people? Could your practice benefit from another source of current and future revenue by providing innovative life insurance solutions without the "noise" associated with this line of business (underwriting and ongoing administration)? What if the only invasive question was "are you actively at work?" And finally, any "white collar" client with existing group term in...

Known scientifically as cannabis and commonly referred to as weed, pot, and many other slang terms, marijuana is one of the most widely used recreational drugs in the US today, and is also used in the treatment of various medical disorders. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (United States, 2002-2014), the 18-34 age group has the greatest incidence of marijuana use. What is important to note, however, is the 55 plus age group is showing the greatest increase in use. Males outnumber females in use by 2 to 1. At present, marijuana is legal for recreational use in nine states...

Being fed by our aging producer population, the under-insured and under-served markets, the $15 trillion plus insurance gap, and the search for new and easier ways to access markets—especially the technologically inclined millennials— life insurance companies are beginning to turn the traditional underwriting process on its head. And early results indicate that they are finding some success. Much of what we have seen so far has been positive and a welcome transformation of an otherwise archaic, invasive and time-consuming insurance acquisition process. However, these changes have implications ...

The tension is palpable. Underwriting is being turned on its head, driven by big data, automation, alternative risk assessment tools, and more predictive underwriting models and processes augmented by analytics. Go to any underwriting industry meeting and there will be considerable time and energy devoted to one or more of these topics, along with a fair amount of angst among the underwriting folks present. Traditional and new industry players speak about the latest risk assessment models and tools, back-tested through hundreds of thousands of client records and data points, producing mortalit...

In our previous two blogs, Marc Schwartz talked about how pricing adjustments among a few life insurers had created an "out-of-control" environment for some of our clients. In part two of "Putting Clients Back in Control," Marc explored several product solutions that can help put your clients back in control – but for you, what's most important is knowing first what your clients want out of their life insurance policies. Here, Marc and DuWayne Kilbo discuss why you need to review your clients' policies now. The idea and process of Policy Review has been around forever. Why is it so important n...

You've met with the clients and their advisors on a few occasions and the time has come to take an application and submit underwriting information to the carriers. However, what you hear next stops you cold: "Our son's friend is also in the business and we want him to shop our application as well to be sure we are getting the best offer and premium available." You pause and think. For several reasons you know that it's never a good idea to pit production sources against one another with multiple carrier submissions. It can complicate matters and often results in an inferior offer and a higher ...

Accelerated underwriting is a new and growing trend that offers important advantages over other programs allowing for an insurance qualification process that does not require examinations or fluids. Having an approved policy in hand can occur in a few business days, rather than weeks, and product pricing is typically more favorable with many carriers offering their full suite of off-the-shelf products with no compensation haircuts. These are all positive factors associated with accelerated programs. However, since most accelerated programs are a triage process, there are no guarantees an appli...

Of all the progressive things the life industry has done in the past few years to advance underwriting standards and make it easier to do business, one area significantly lagging is charitable life underwriting. In charitable situations, the maximum amount of coverage available across almost every carrier in the industry is based upon a multiplication factor—typically 10—of one's past annual giving to a charity. So if an applicant on average has given $10,000 annually to a particular charity and desires to leverage this giving by allowing the charity to own life insurance on his life, he would...

A New Program Offers Life Insurance for Declined Cases.  It always seems to happen. You have a client—probably one of your best clients — who desperately needs to buy life insurance to cover a loan or a business buy-sell and is willing to pay the price for whatever they can get. You've sealed the deal — but because of health problems or other issues you are unable to deliver an offer from any carrier—at any price. It's a conundrum for the ages, but now there is a solution. Windsor recently developed a relationship with a creative A.M. Best "A" rated domestic carrier to tackle this very pr...

Jumbo cases can be challenging. Defined by many carriers as total line of coverage applied for including coverage in force exceeding $65 million, this is especially true for super jumbo applications that involve total lines in excess of $100 million, and where health conditions or applicant age become factors. Every application is unique and individual case facts make the task of putting jumbo and super jumbo cases together anywhere from reasonably challenging to downright impossible. However, with premiums from five figures to several million, we need to approach these situations with working...