Over the last two weeks there has been some confusion about the implementation of a change in the claims philosophy we apply to our fracture cover proposition. The purpose of this communication is to clarify the situation.

Background:

The intention of our fracture cover is to provide customers with a lump sum payment to help them manage the impact a debilitating injury can have on their short term day to day life. We offer comprehensive cover that offers generous payments for a large range of conditions.

Medical technology is constantly changing and this includes how minor fractures can be identified. When developing the proposition we didn’t anticipate receiving claims for these types of injuries and they had not been included in our pricing structure. It is for this reason that we have introduced exclusions for avulsion/chips and micro fractures. Currently, claims for these conditions represent a very small minority of our overall claims, approximately 1%. However, there is the potential that these could increase over time hence the need for us to introduce the exclusions now.

We firmly believe that our fracture cover continues to provide excellent additional benefits to assist with the financial impact these injuries present. Furthermore, we believe we can offer cover to more people as our fracture cover is available across our life insurance, critical illness and income protection products. These changes should not alter an adviser’s ability to recommend our Fracture Cover benefit with confidence.

Implementation of this change:

Due to the confusion in communicating the change to our claims philosophy, we will now implement the change from the 18^th November, when our communication was issued. To ensure there is no confusion with advisers or customers, we will be writing to all customers who submitted a fracture cover application from 18^th Sept up to 17^th November to confirm that their fracture cover will not include the exclusions for avulsions/chips and micro fractures.