Opinion

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) is thinking about dividing insurance into two categories - one more complex and one less so. But while it is pretty much set that critical illness and income protection will be in the higher-risk category, industry...

The Law Commission's consultation paper suggests that life insurers should introduce a five-year cut-off period for declining claims for non-disclosure. But life insurance is the only product in the entire protection range to be included. Why do you think...

The Protection Review that was published in July has revealed that the market is holding up reasonably well, but there is still no sign of a real move to close the £2.3trn protection gap. How can we begin to close it over the coming year?

A recent report from the Financial Ombudsman Service showed there was a 17% decline in the number of income protection and critical illness disputes it had received during the past 12 months compared with the previous year. What do you think of these...

Following the implementation of the new critical illness (CI) definitions in April, the IFA market has called for positive retrospective CI changes to be made to existing policies. What do you think about such an idea? What are the pros and cons?

What role does commission have to play in the provision of pure protection advice, and could the market ever move towards a purely fee-based proposition?

In February, Prudential published the results of a survey that suggested a staggering number of people had been victims of declined claims. The market reacted strongly against the publication of such statistics, brandishing them "scaremongering". Was...

Several supermarkets have entered into the private medical insurance and protection arenas. Is this good for the industry or will it further tarnish the industry's reputation as retail firms are more likely to offer insurance products without advice?...

The pension term assurance debacle rattled the industry at the end of last year. But just how badly has it damaged the reputation of the industry and how long will it take to be rectified? Has it caused irreparable damage?

The Association of British Insurers has said it will look into Swiss Re's new findings that the cancer definition should be termed differently. Bearing in mind there has been a working group discussing the issues of redefining the critical illness definitions,...