a big announcement for the critical illness market AND A WEEK OF CELEBRATION
Last week was quite a week for the Protection Guru team with a special announcement, a member of the team being recognised and then our very own celebration of the amazing things this industry does. There may have been one or two sore heads on Saturday morning, but we are back this morning and excited to share more about exactly what we are doing and why at Protection Guru.
Designed By Doctors Announcement
I want to start this week by highlighting Protection Guru’s “Designed by Doctors” which was announced last Friday. The initiative aims to improve the clarity of critical illness wordings and ensure that definitions are using the latest medical terminology by utilising the expertise of our panel of practising medical professionals.
The reason we are doing this is because over an extended period of time, we have found that many critical illness definitions have become overly complicated, often contradictory and regularly using outdated diagnostic techniques, treatment types or gradings. In many cases our own hugely qualified doctors are unable to confirm with any confidence exactly what is and isn’t covered within certain wordings.
To support insurers and reinsurers, our doctors considered ten conditions where they believe current wordings could be improved and have explained exactly what is wrong with the current definitions. They have also provided an example wording that mirrors the breadth of cover currently provided within the ABI definition or the industry standard if insurers routinely offer broader coverage. The conditions we have analysed are:
- Cancer
- Heart attack
- Stroke
- Total permanent disability
- Multiple sclerosis
- Benign brain tumour
- Parkinson’s disease
- Coma
- Deafness
- Carcinoma in situ / high-grade pre-invasive lesions
Over the coming months we will look to work with insurers to help improve the clarity and terminology used in their wordings and will provide accreditations to those insurers that can meet our doctors standards. To be clear, we are not looking to increase or decrease the breadth of cover provided within critical illness plans, instead we are looking to help produce wordings that when put in front of a doctor, the doctor is clear on what is covered.
Super proud of the women in our team
On Thursday night I was very lucky to spend the evening with four of Protection Guru’s amazingly talented women to celebrate the Women’s Recognition Awards. To say that we at Protection Guru are in awe of all the women that work with us is an understatement and I had a great night with Niki, Joanne, Poppy and Jessie.
We were soo proud that both Niki and Jo were shortlisted in the Woman in Protection category and ecstatic that Niki managed to take the award when up against such tough competition. Joanne, we will get you that award next year!
Other winners on the night included the very deserving Emma Thomson from Sesame Bankhall Group and Nina Brown from Pam Brown Mortgages.
A day of celebration at the Protection Guru Awards
On Friday we held the third annual Protection Guru Awards and were joined by the great and the good of the industry to celebrate the great outcomes that we can achieve. The awards started with a keynote from our very own Ian McKenna who warned of the risks of a shrinking insurer market a reduced competition.
The event then progressed with so many deserving winners (more on our winners to come) and amazing feedback from the many attendees. The whole team worked incredibly hard in the lead up to and during the day and I especially want to thank Samantha Smith, without whom we would probably be running the event in one of our houses with a takeaway and Jack Easter who did a sterling job rounding up our presenters and supporting during the day.
Huge congratulations to everyone that was shortlisted, highly commended and our winners!
Anyway, lots more to come on the awards and our winners so watch this space!
