ICICI Prudential Life is betting big on health business, a new area for life insurance companies.About 12-15% of the life plans are said to be health products.
12-15% of policies sold by private-sector firm are health-linked
KOKATA: ICICI Prudential Life is betting big on health business, a new area for life insurance companies. About 12-15% of the life plans that the private-sector life insurer writes every month are said to be health products.
The firm, which has created a specialised team dedicated to selling “benefit” products, is likely to unveil a category-specific campaign shortly. Also on the anvil are plans to explore new planks within the category such as reimbursement policies that are similar to mediclaim products from general insurance companies.
Most specialised healthcare products by life companies are structured to provide a co-ordinated care proposition — providing financial support and some sort of an income replacement to meet the cost of health complications.
Currently, the scope of the healthcare market is estimated to be around Rs 60,000 crore and the share of insurance is less than 1%. Moreover, over 80% of the market is indemnity driven and is largely covered by mediclaim.
Bhargav Dasgupta, executive director, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, said, “It is a big challenge to create awareness and understanding of the need of health insurance products.
As a category, health insurance is generally is not a top of the mind product. We plan to launch a suite of products eventually that covers the entire need spectrum.
The idea is not just to provide against medical bills but participate in customer health plans”.
The company has put up a dedicated team to sell health insurance products, for which, it is spending on training frontline distribution teams. It plans to cross sell and up-sell to the existing base.
Without divulging any targets on health insurance, Dasgupta said, “The present health premium of life companies is very small at present.
But sensing huge potential, almost all life insurance companies would eventually contribute to the health category. In fact, they could drive larger growth in the health space”.
ICICI Prudential currently has a portfolio of hospitalisation plans and critical and specialised illness products.
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