From the editor: Christmas service

I thought I'd put a note out to let you know that we'll be running a skeleton service with our news alerts over the next few days - going down to one news alert a day between the 22nd and 24th.

That alert will be going out at half 12 for those remaining days before we all break up for Christmas. 

We'll be back and resuming full service from Monday the 5th of January.  

Thanks for all your support over the past year. And what a 12 months it's been. OK, we didn't have a big piece of game-changing legislation for both insurers and advisers, such as the Gender Directive, as with previous years.

However, the change we did experience was far more organic - a desire from the industry itself to make itself more transparent, customer-friendly and promote protection and health as a social good.

Some notable examples this year included, the biggest example of industry collaboration - Seven Families (which we discuss on page 10 asking how advisers can discuss this with clients), group risk trade body GRID collating group protection claim statistics for the first time and insurers improving their critical illness definitions, particularly around heart attack and stroke.

While protection is often accused of being the industry where nothing happens, we've had some genuinely exciting product launches this year. Specifically, we at COVER, applaud firms who have embraced digital innovations and made their policies and processes much easier for customers to claim on.

Looking to the New Year - there are several things we have reported on over the past year that will come into force. Many of the CMA's rulings on the private healthcare market will begin next April, as will the government's flagship Health and Work Service. I'm eager to see what will happen.

From the COVER team - we hope you enjoy your time off over the Festive season and have a Happy New Year.