"Pay death claims in a week" - Munich Re

Death claims should be paid quicker and the protection industry needs to support its existing customers better, says Munich Re.

The re-insurer challenged the industry to follow its lead and voiced fears that it risks "building an ornamental garden while the house falls down" without doing so.

Speaking at the Protection Review, Andy Milburn, head of marketing at Munich Re, suggested talk of increasing sales was premature.

"We're in a declining market, why are we talking about growth?" he says.

"Why do we want to grow the market before we stabalise it? We are seriously in danger of building an ornamental garden while the house falls down.

"We have to spend more time thinking about our existing customers," he adds.

Milburn believes one way in which this can be done is to accelerate the payment of death claims, something which had been discussed earlier in the conference.

His goal is to eventually get death claims paid within a week, something he urged the rest of the industry to embrace.

"So existing customers want death claims paid more quickly, we've heard it already," he says.

"We can do something about it. The Association of British Insurers (ABI) is doing something about it and we are going to share a programme of activity, as part of the ABI's long term vision for the industry. Why do we need to wait for probate to be granted? If they're dead they're dead.

"Pay the claim, and if you think it's dodgy, give them £10,000. You might get stung four times out of 2000 because of fraud, but take that into account with pricing - just do it," he adds.

When questioned by Richard Verdin, director of protection marketing at Aviva, about whether re-insurers would follow the lead if an insurer paid a claim under the new conditions, Milburn replied: "We will."