The insurance of government employees and assets, at the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) that were hitherto shrouded in secrecy, which fuelled corruption among government officials and staff of insurance companies, will soon be a thing of the past.
Consequently, government and its employees who are supposed to be beneficiaries of insurance protection under different contracts, will also begin to enjoy more value additions, with prompt payment of claims.
This is coming on the heels of a new directive by the industry regulator, the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM), requiring insurance companies to stop engaging in ‘blind cover’.
The directive now require insurers to get details of employees or assets covered in any insurance contract with government or its agencies, otherwise such contract will not be approved by NAICOM, and affected companies will be sanctioned.
BusinessDay findings show that as a result of blind covers, government officials were collecting kickbacks from premiums paid to insurers, thereby putting the participating companies under pressure of liquidity.
And when claims arise, insurers are often unable to pay or start to argue about details of insured persons who came for claims, since it was not disclosed at the commencement of the contract.
Most times, premiums were inflated and paid by government, with only a fraction of the total amount actually meant for the insurance contract.
Overtime, this has led to bad image for the insurance industry, with many having been accused of premium fraud in government business. They also have been seen as only interested in collecting premium and not wanting to pay claims.
Mohammed Kari, commissioner for Insurance/CEO of NAICOM said today, no insurance company will insure government employee or assets without providing details of the covered risk.
“It is not possible, and that is the direction we are going,” Kari said.
Speaking to consumers in Lagos, Kari also stated “We believe the principles of Ease of Doing Business order should permeate through the value chain of our sectoral service providers.”
According to him, insurance institutions have also engaged themselves on the need to come up with service level agreements, detailing how they would improve service delivery above what the law provides especially on timelines of task completion.
“I am happy to note here that they have so far agreed to shorten some tasks completion time of their major activities on the basis of self-regulation and market agreements, first between themselves and secondly between them and the consumers of their services.”
He further noted that the Commission had signalled the issue of effective and efficient service delivery to consumers as a key priority with its establishment of Complaint Bureau Unit to deal with complains from members of the public against any insurance operator.
This unit, he said, had recently been upgraded and is headed by a Deputy Director to attend to aggrieved consumers.
“Many aggrieved consumers have continued to access this desk to register their complaints with the commission.”
Kari therefore advised consumers to take advantage of the Complaint Desk and report their challenges, assuring that any company found in default shall be compelled to do the needful.
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