Cirencester Friendly calls for IP claims clarity

Cirencester Friendly has announced that 94% of its income protection (IP) claims were paid last year.

On releasing the results it also called for all IP providers to join it and release their approval rates to help advisers and consumers make more informed choices.

The provider approved 947 IP claims from the 1005 eligible for consideration, paying out £2.6m in benefits.

This marks an increase of 5% on 2008, when 89% (856) of 962 eligible claims were paid from 988 total claims received.

Its sum paid-out also increased from £1.9m in the previous year.

In total 58 (6%) were declined for not meeting the claims requirement for:
• not supplying proof of earnings;
• not supplying medical evidence;
• no loss of earnings;
• non-disclosure;
• contract was in arrears;
• claim was submitted too late.

An initial 2.4% (25) of the 1030 claims it received were considered ineligible because it was either: for an already excluded medical condition; made before the expiry of the deferred period; or was during the initial 30 day waiting period.

In most declined cases, the reason for non-payment related to non-disclosure at the time of the contract being taken out and no evidence of loss of earnings.

Paul Hudson, CEO of Cirencester Friendly, Hudson said: "For the sake of transparency, unlike many companies in the income protection arena, we have been publishing our claims statistics for many years and are currently one of just a handful of income protection providers to do so.

"It is gratifying to see just how much is being paid out for income protection products, but a detailed breakdown of all individual providers' claims rates, as well as the industry wide figures, would be even more useful to consumers as well as IFAs.

"Claims statistics are particularly useful in determining how likely the firm is going pay-out should a policy holder have to make a claim," he added.