Issue 2002-10:   March 12, 2002

This newsletter is for members of the Canadian Insurance Industry, and those who serve it. The newsletter is published weekly, and notes information mostly about the use of the Internet and related technologies in the industry. Some is international, where we feel it is relevant to Canada.

Claims

Transamerica Life Canada completes review of Supreme Court Decisions. In the case of Oldfield vs. Transamerica Life Canada, the respondent's husband died while carrying 30 cocaine-filled condoms in his stomach, when one burst and caused a fatal heart attack. In the case of Goulet vs. Transamerica Life Canada, the respondent's husband died when a bomb he was attempting to plant in a car exploded at Dorval Airport. In both instances, the policies in question were life insurance policies, and not accidental death and dismemberment policies. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/claims/canada/TransAm200203.php

Accident Support Services International Ltd., facilitators of collision reporting for police and the insurance industry, announced that the Peterborough Collision Reporting Centre opened January 21, 2002. This begins a 6-month pilot project with the Peterborough Lakefield Community Police Service. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/claims/announce/ASSIPeter200203.php

Effective immediately, ReplacementFinder has slashed manual research fees from $9.00 to $3.99 per item. According to Mark Kuper, creator, "We want to reach a critical mass whereby almost, without exception, ReplacementFinder has vendors who can fulfill every need. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/claims/announce/ReplaceFee200203.php

Marketing

Manulife Financial will allow its healthiest life insurance customers to purchase critical illness coverage with no extra medical exams or questions, the first insurer in Canada to do so. Under the automatic pre-approval program, new Canadian customers who are non-smokers, in above-average health, and with no family history of cancer will automatically qualify for up to $100,000 of Manulife's industry-leading Lifecheque critical illness insurance. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/market/canada/ManulifeCC200203.php

Conning & Company Study Reports: In the months since the World Trade Center disaster, there has been and will likely continue to be a big ramp up in applications and sales for life insurance products. And much of this business, in keeping with a more intense security focus across the country, has been written for fixed life insurance products such as universal life, whole life and term versus variable annuities or variable life insurance products. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/market/other/ConningLife200203.php

Distribution

IAA, Future One reveal technology study results. Carriers, agents &brokers agree on technology uses but are disconnected from consumers, according to study. The study explores whether agents, brokers and carriers can find common ground on technology, and looks at how they can cooperatively optimize the role of technology. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/distribution/other/IIAA200203.php

ACORD has created a survey to determine what eCommerce solution providers can offer to interested insurers, brokers and reinsurers to utilize the ACORD reinsurance standards (formerly known as the Joint Venture or "JV" standards). Details at www.insurance-canada.ca/distribution/other/ACORD200203.php

CSIO Insurance Portal

Bill Wallace comments that progress continues in incremental steps. For the Function Bundles Insurance-Canda.ca has defined, the development or build of Full Quotes Auto completed March 6. However CSIO will wait for more development work to complete before moving a group of bundles to testing.

Policy Management

In 1998, New York Life International set out on a mission to identify a multilingual, multi-currency software solution that could be readily implemented anywhere in the world, for any product. After a prolonged and exhaustive search and evaluation process, New York Life International selected Sherwood International's Amarta LIFE solution in January 2000. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/poladmin/announce/SherwoodNYL200203a.php

e-Business & Technology

The LIMRA International CEO Outlook Index showed a slight increase in fourth quarter 2001, the first sign of improvement in a year. The index reflects optimism by many CEOs of U.S. and Canadian life insurance companies that industry conditions are improving and that their companies will see higher sales in 2002. More at www.insurance-canada.ca/ebusiness/canada/LIMRA200203.php

from Doug:

Insurance distribution and technology is receiving much attention. Insurance-Canada.ca's next two seminars will address this topic. On Thursday April 11 a Property and Casualty focus on the broker distribution channel, and on Friday May 10 a Life oriented seminar on Straight Through Processing linking the participants in the supply-distribution chain into a more continuous cross-organizational process. Details on both will be posted with links from our seminar page at www.insurance-canada.ca/seminars/icsem.php

The sun is shining through my office window - a welcome respite after several days of cold and wind. More tentative tastes of spring for the next few days. If you are immersed in March break activities, enjoy!