Insurance
Partners Life enhancements
Tuesday 31st of March 2015
They will be automatically added to existing clients’ policies.
Most significant improvements are to:
- Private Medical Cover – cover for specialist consultations and tests following surgery or hospitalisation for cancer will no longer be limited to six months following discharge and will continue to be covered until the cancer is cured or in remission;
- Trauma Cover – the 90-day stand-down on several partial payment conditions has been removed;
- Mortgage Repayment Cover and Household Expenses Cover – these are designed to protect mortgage or rent payments and other household expenses and pay a monthly benefit on disability. Last year Partners Life added a new “TPD Booster” option to Income Cover. The TPD Booster Benefit, if selected, boosts a client’s monthly benefit by one third if they are Totally and Permanently Disabled. All personal monthly disability benefits will now include this TPD Booster optional benefit. TPD means unable to do their own occupation.
- Income Cover – a benefit called Fixed Payment Term Reset Benefit has been added.
- Severe Trauma Cover – is designed to pay benefits only for significant trauma conditions, those likely to have a very big financial impact. Paying benefits only for severe trauma conditions allows the premium to be significantly lower than that for traditional trauma covers. Lower premium in turn allows the very big sums insured needed to adequately protect against severe trauma conditions. Clients can typically get up to four times as much Severe Trauma Cover compared with Trauma Cover for the same premium.
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FMA outlines its latest expectations for advisers
Paul Flood: The danger is that the 'goalposts' (regarding what is acceptable or unacceptable adviser conduct) may be susceptible to change. Our 'Principles based' legal/regulatory environment lends itself to “prevalence-induced concept change” over time, perhaps not so much in the written laws and Code, as in the interpretation of the prescribed principles.
2 days ago Steve Wright
FMA outlines its latest expectations for advisers
Just a tip, if you use more than six, six letter words in a sentence you lose most Kiwi's. So avoid client/adviser confusion when writing your post or article if you would like it read and understood.
Ironically, my last sentence was not likely read.
3 days ago Backstage
FMA outlines its latest expectations for advisers
All things said are great aspirational goals for a great financial advice industry, it mirrors what both the legislation and the code requires.
However, like most things discussed it talks about what's expected not how it's done. The hardest aspect of financial advice today isn't what it is, it is how it is done.
The how only comes from those that have done it, the how is only provided with examples. Guidance documents that spell out what's required along side how it it done.
We’re still dealing with the same issues we started with in 2021, figuring out the how. And figuring out the how in every advice business is consuming resources that could easily be shortcut by the FMA demonstrating what they are expecting.
It's not about “do it this way” its about this is the sorts of things we’re looking for.
In the absence of standards and expectations, guesswork prevails. That represents significant risk to FAPs and the result is onerous overcooked advice processes for multiple advice operations and undercooked she’ll be right for single operators focused on getting the work done.
Both approaches have potential for harm and as its been said earlier, leaves advisers open to explain they haven't been speeding with the authorities have pulled them over.
The advice industry needs guidance on the how we know the what already.
5 days ago Jon-Paul Hale
Who is responsible for notifying policy changes?
Sticking an oar in, while we have “service” requirements the expectation that an adviser is responsible for discussing said change is relying heavily on assumption.
1. That the client hasn't moved and contact details haven't been updated. It happens more often than many think.
2. It assumes there is a servicing agreement in place to provide service. Remember the requirement is to scope service not provide it. A client deciding to have ad-hoc service on their request is a legally valid position to have.
3. If there is a service agreement that's realistic to what is expected, how long does the adviser push the issue to have the discussion before moving on with everything else they have to do? Again, a point that is not clear in the guidance to date.
The challenge of the present rules is the adviser is responsible for ensuring the client understands the advice provided.
How do you ensure you're covering this if a client doesn't engage despite genuine attempts to manage it?
There's still a lot of “what if’s” in this whole are we’re only going to have clarity on once someone is taken to task about it.
But first we need to have clarity on what ongoing service actually is, because right now demonstrated by the direct providers a letter once per year with a please call if you want to discuss is the current minimum…
5 days ago Jon-Paul Hale
FMA outlines its latest expectations for advisers
To correct errors in my previous post: "policies, templates, and controls" should read "policies, processes, systems and controls", and "is more conductive" should read "is more conducive".
5 days ago Paul Flood