Legal & General has said Group Income Protection (IP) declinature figures for 2012, were down from 2.2% in 2011 to 0.8 in 2012.
This follows their announcement that it paid out 91% of its individual IP claims in 2012.
Legal & General's Group IP encourages companies to notify them as soon as an employee has been off sick and last year 74% of employees were able to return to work before the end of the deferred period (typically this is six months).
Of those unable to return to work at this time, 99% of the notifications assessed for claim go onto receive a proportion of their salary for an agreed period.
Group IP benefit figures for 2012 show 2,956 absence notifications were received in 2012, up by almost 22% on 2011. Stress remains the leading cause of absence, up from 34% to 36% of all notifications, while1,782 claims were paid with benefits totalling £30.5m
The insurer added that group life claim figures for 2012 show£201 million paid in 2012 for 2,003 claims, while 118 Group Critical illness claims were paid, totalling £7.1million.
Vanessa Sallows, Underwriting and Benefits Director for Legal & General's Group Protection business said: " I am very proud of these figures.
"In 2012 our average notification period went down from 8.7 weeks to 7.7 and we spent over £3.2million in rehabilitation services and support to help people on the road to recovery and back to work.
"Despite the increase in notifications during 2012, we managed to help more individuals so they are able to return to work."
