The bright side

11 January 2010 8:00 am

2009 will be looked back on as a pretty tough year by most of us but there were some definite reasons to be cheerful if you work in the protection industry.

Not many sectors could boast new entrants to their market but we had two high-profile new kids in the shape of PruProtect and Fortis. The latter only just allowing their product to be marketed by the adviser world at large and basing their proposition on an impressive combination of a sharp online underwriting system, backed up by readily available human underwriters and a competitive price point.

PruProtect, on the other hand, have entered the arena with the most innovative concept of recent years. They have also used 2009 to refine their offering and create a new Essentials version, which seems to be proving very popular. Theirs was always going to be a tough sell, as it involves asking advisers (and customers) to change habits and be open-minded to a new idea, so the hard work is still ahead for their sales team.

Tom Baigrie’s Consumer Protection and Insurance Engagement Campaign could not reach the ambitious targets it had set itself and while this will be seen by many as bad news, it says a lot about our sector that it got as far as it did and managed to raise significant contributions from some participants in the process. Tom’s campaign could prove the first step in raising consumer aware- ness of their vulnerability and need for our products.

After 30 years in the insurance industry and following an extraordinary contribution both here and in his efforts for charitable causes, Peter Le Beau received an MBE last year.

Finally, following a sensible and pragmatic consultation process, and thanks to the (mostly) calm and informed arguments of our major players, the FSA have confirmed that it is their intention to leave protection out of their plans for the banning of commission-based sales.

This not only means that existing distributors of protection can continue to do so without fear of their clients running to the online aggregators to avoid paying a fee but that we can look forward to welcoming some new advisers on board, as they look to use protection commission income to mitigate the fees their clients pay.

Bring on 2010.

Phil Jeynes is head of new business at Direct Life and Pensions Lifequote

If you enjoyed this article, sign up here to receive daily email updates from Money Marketing and Follow @_moneymarketing