Insurers have applauded news the ABI is to refine definitions insurers use to report claims pay-out rates to ensure greater consistency across the industry.
A set of common definitions will be developed through an ABI led initiative, and will be used to report 2013 data, beginning in early 2014.
Stephen Gay, Head of Life, Savings and Protection at the ABI, said: "The new protection claims definitions to be developed will ensure consistency in how protection insurance claims figures are reported."
Peter Hamilton, Zurich's Head of Retail Propositions said: "This is good news for customers - we support any initiative that will help provide consistency and clarity in the presentation of claims statistics and having a standard set of definitions in place will facilitate this.
"At the same time we believe it is crucial that the ABI works with members to come up with the right set of definitions."
Chris Pollard, Head of Underwriting, Claims and Operations for Friends Life Individual Protection added: "This will clearly ensure greater consistency across the industry. For some time we have felt that the lack of a consistent basis for this data means that it can be misleading for both advisers and consumers.
"Increased transparency is undoubtedly positive for the industry and a uniform approach to data disclosure means that all those interacting with it are working off a level playing field."
The ABI also announced insurers paid out over £6 million every day in 2012 across life, critical illness (CI) and income protection (IP) policies.
£4 million a day paid out across 28,000 families for life insurance claims, with an average pay-out of £49,000. 98% of claims were paid, up from 97% in the previous year.
Over 11,700 people received an average of £70,000 from critical illness policies. The equivalent of £2.2 million was paid every day and 91% of claims were paid.
Over 13,200 people received payments from income protection policies, with insurers paying out an average of just over £9,000 per claimant.
