Mr. Bower referenced his report on slides 104-108 stating that for the 4th quarter, Direct Individual Life Premium was relatively flat compared to the prior two years. Single premium was down but in line with projections that was set for the year. The renewal premium was up 3% and continues to see good growth. He continued by stating that we did see a decrease on the Farm Bureau Insurance side of individual Life sales because we were focused on the Property & Casualty growth; however, we still had a good year.
Mr. Bower highlighted the 2015 results of issued policies/face amount on slide 106, stating we issued just shy of 12,000 Life insurance policies for the year with 45% of those policies being permanent and 38% term policies. Summarizing …show more content…
Bower provided a brief summary of the year in review by stating we realigning individuals in what they do and have integrated the new business and policy service teams into one team calling them Customer Service and Operation Teams. This will make us more efficient. Another big change we made was to take our United Home Life Customer Service Center, now called the Life Contact Center, and have them take all incoming calls no matter the distribution or what company and it’s working very well. In regards to the claims system, Mr. Bower commented that we continue to implement to put new pieces in a first notice of loss last year; the additional of the policy search functionality and now we are inputting claims into our new system. He stated that this is real exciting and new for the staff and we have already seen a 30% reduction in the time that it’s taking them to enter a claim into the …show more content…
Bower referenced slide 109 commenting that the Life Company also met with A.M. Best and also had a very good meeting with A.M. Best. He noted that our analyst quit A.M. Best right before our meeting; therefore, we currently do not have an analyst assigned to us but expect to have one assigned within the next couple of months. Mr. Bower doesn’t anticipate any changes in the “A” rating that United Farm Family currently has.
Mr. Bower referenced page 145 in Appendix for the actions of the Interest Rate Committee. The Interest Rate Committee did take action on older annuities and older deposit money to reduce the interest rate by 25 basis points. And, in addition, we had 14 older annuity products that had an excess interest rate that was not guaranteed that we removed to bring those down to a guaranteed rate. He stated that we are doing this to continue to mitigate the situation we have with a lower interest rate
Mr. Bower highlighted the 2015 results of issued policies/face amount on slide 106, stating we issued just shy of 12,000 Life insurance policies for the year with 45% of those policies being permanent and 38% term policies. Summarizing …show more content…
Bower provided a brief summary of the year in review by stating we realigning individuals in what they do and have integrated the new business and policy service teams into one team calling them Customer Service and Operation Teams. This will make us more efficient. Another big change we made was to take our United Home Life Customer Service Center, now called the Life Contact Center, and have them take all incoming calls no matter the distribution or what company and it’s working very well. In regards to the claims system, Mr. Bower commented that we continue to implement to put new pieces in a first notice of loss last year; the additional of the policy search functionality and now we are inputting claims into our new system. He stated that this is real exciting and new for the staff and we have already seen a 30% reduction in the time that it’s taking them to enter a claim into the …show more content…
Bower referenced slide 109 commenting that the Life Company also met with A.M. Best and also had a very good meeting with A.M. Best. He noted that our analyst quit A.M. Best right before our meeting; therefore, we currently do not have an analyst assigned to us but expect to have one assigned within the next couple of months. Mr. Bower doesn’t anticipate any changes in the “A” rating that United Farm Family currently has.
Mr. Bower referenced page 145 in Appendix for the actions of the Interest Rate Committee. The Interest Rate Committee did take action on older annuities and older deposit money to reduce the interest rate by 25 basis points. And, in addition, we had 14 older annuity products that had an excess interest rate that was not guaranteed that we removed to bring those down to a guaranteed rate. He stated that we are doing this to continue to mitigate the situation we have with a lower interest rate