Mortgage Repayment and Household Expenses Cover sums assured for self-employed clients can only be based on actual mortgage or actual household expenses – the percentage of income basis will no longer be availableĪ new Payment Term Restriction Option will replace the previous Mental Health Payment Term Restriction Option which was available under Income Cover (generating a 10% premium discount). Pre-disability Income will be re-defined to be based on the most recently completed annual financials immediately prior to the date of disability, rather than being based on the best consecutive 12 months over the previous 3 years Only Indemnity Loss of Earnings Income Cover benefits only will be availableĪ mandatory Waiting Period of four weeks will apply – no other waiting period options will be available Issued for Income Cover, Mortgage Repayment Cover and Household Expenses Cover for selfemployed clients:Īgreed value won't be offered to this group. More obvious over-insurance components inherent in current monthly disability products.įrom 5 April 2020 onwards, the following changes will apply to all new business quoted and While there is in increase in blue collar workers, which is explainable, when Partners dug into the data it found self-employed people were the ones staying on claim for lengthy periods. One of the issues is how long a policyholder stays on claim with disability products. This isn't a blip, she says, but a trend. She says claims experience has been changing over the past couple of years are they are way out of line with reinsurance tables. "As a result, we have adopted a strategy to minimise access to self-employed clients to some of the more obvious over-insurance components inherent in current monthly disability products." "Pricing increases can help address this experience for existing clients, however in order to avoid continuous general price increases into the future, we believe it is prudent to stop compounding the issue by changing the types of new business that we offer to this client segment. " Self-employed includes sole traders, small business owners and self-employed contractors (excluding part-time self-employed clients who fall into the Class 5 occupation category). She says Partners Life has "identified self-employed clients as a client segment which is disproportionately, adversely impacting our disability claims experience." The biggest changes are in new business for self-employed people. Ballantyne doesn't expect the pricing changes to impact on its in-force book, but concedes new sales maybe effected, especially by advisers who sell on price.