LIVE WEBINAR COVER Talks

Closing the Beneficiary Gap in Protection

Putting the right protection in place is only part of the job. We also need to consider what happens when that policy eventually pays out, and whether the benefit reaches the people the customer intended, in the way they expected.

Join Gregor Sked, Senior Protection Technical Manager at Royal London, and Ron Wheatcroft, Technical Manager at Swiss Re, for this live broadcast as they explore the "beneficiary gap" and what it tells us about how protection is being put in place across the market.

Drawing on fresh insights from Royal London and Swiss Re, the discussion will consider why so many protection policies still have no clear direction for death benefits, despite the growing use of trusts and beneficiary nomination. Swiss Re estimates that 63.6% of new single own-life policies in 2025 had no direction of death benefits, even after trust and beneficiary nomination uptake is taken into account.

Learning Outcomes

1. Explain the beneficiary gap and why the direction of protection benefits is an important consideration when setting up and reviewing protection arrangements.
2. Compare the role of trusts and beneficiary nomination in directing life insurance benefits and recognise how different approaches can help support the customer's intended outcome.
3. Identify practical ways advisers, insurers, and distributors can help reduce the beneficiary gap, through better customer conversations, simpler processes, and greater consideration of benefit direction across both new and existing protection business.

Cameron Roberts is the editor of COVER Magazine, a leading publication for protection and health professionals. In his decade-long career in journalism, Cameron has occupied numerous editorial roles, writing about financial services, the events sector, oil and gas, information services, automation, robotics and travel.

In his role as editor, Cameron focuses on how the protection industry is evolving, looking at new products, rising stars in protection, DEI, sustainability and customer care.

Gregor has over 12 years of financial services experience. His early career was predominantly with Standard Life as a presenter in Standard Life's workplace pension engagement team. He joined Royal London in 2018 to spend more time on protection in the Intermediary market. Gregor is involved in developing adviser facing content, presenting, writing articles, and commenting for the press.

He recently received his level 4 diploma in regulated financial planning and is now studying for the level 6 advanced diploma in financial planning.

Even though he spends most weeks travelling the length and breadth of the UK for business, in his spare time he loves travelling the world and planning future adventures with his young family.

Ron works with the market, looking at the likely impact of legislation and regulation. He's a regular commentator in the media.

He's a member of GRiD's Steering Committee and Raising the Profile Working Party, as well as the ABI's Social Care Working Party. He also sits on the Cabinet Office Champion Access to Insurance Working Party Steering Group and the Building Resilient Households Steering Group.

Outside work, Ron ignores Premiership hype, settling instead for watching Gillingham where the trapdoor back into League Two is ominously wide open.