New research from the UK manufacturers organisation, EEF, indicates that the downward trend in sickness absence rates in the sector has plateaued.
According to the latest EEF/Westfield Health report, the overall rate among manufacturers employees remained unchanged in 2011 compared with 2010, at 2.2%, and the average number of working days lost to absence held stead at 5.1 days per employee.
However, EEF members are concerned at a divergence between short and long-term absence rates, with almost 40% of firms questioned seeing an increase in long-term rates last year, mainly as a result of a jump in staff off work due to stress, anxiety and depression.
In addition, the issue of presenteeism (whereby staff turn up for work when unwell) has become a hot topic for discussion, with 55% of companies expressing concerns in this area.
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has referred the UK private healthcare market to the Competition Commission for further investigation.
The move follows a market investigation by the watchdog and a public consultation on its findings.
The OFT says it continues to hold the view that the market could work better for patients, and that there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that competition is restricted or distorted.
Features identified by the OFT are:
A lack of easily comparable information available to patients and their GPs on the quality and costs of private healthcare services; this may mean that competition between private healthcare providers and between consultants is not as effective as it could be.
Ageas Protect has bolstered its sales leadership team with the appointment of Vicky Churcher to the post of head of Sales Delivery and that of Lee Gill to the post of head of Sales Strategy.
In their new positions the pair will report directly to Managing Director Darren Spriggs.
The two appointments support the firms intention of providing the intermediary market with a range of innovative products and services.
Churcher joins the firm last year as national sales manager, and in her new role is tasked with fostering intermediary relationships and increasing the firms share of the market (presently 8.1%).
Gill joined Ageas Protect as a strategic account manager last year and will focus upon the firms sales strategy, which dovetails with his present current strategic accounts responsibility.
Spriggs described the pair as natural candidates to take forward the firms intermediary distribution strategy.
Aviva has revamped its support to advisers to help them overcome barriers in selling family protection.
The insurer wants advisers to emotionally engage with consumers by focusing on the positive aspects of family life and opening up conversations around What makes your family special?.
By switching the emphasis from protection products to family life, they should be able to change the way people talk and think about protection.
The initiative is backed by new material that can help facilitate the right kind of conversation and provides insights into potential life stage triggers, as a means of pinpointing hidden protection needs.
Commentators offer further thoughts about the Supreme Court’s review of the health law.
The Wall Street Journal: ObamaCare Will Punish State Budgets It is now clear that the law will impose heavy burdens on state and family budgets and increasingly possible that its mandate that all Americans purchase health insurance or face penalties will be ruled unconstitutional. … We and our Republican colleagues voted against the law two years ago and will continue to work toward a smarter, step-by-step solution that will make health care available to more Americans at a lower cost to the federal government, the states, and individuals seeking care (Sens. Lamar Alexander, Mike Johanns, John Hoeven and Jim Risch, 3/29).
A new insurance consortium, Xin, has been launched by Lloyd’s syndicates, specialising in helping businesses protect against the on-going threat of a terrorist attack in Asia.
Amlin, Markel, Canopius and Argenta have set up the Singapore-based consortium to provide terrorist insurance protection to businesses operating in South East Asia and the Asia Pacific region.
The consortium’s underwriters believe there is a need to raise awareness of the availability of such specialist cover in a region, which is considered significantly under-insured for terrorist attack
Amlins managing director of Singapore operations, Simon Clarke, comments: “Our vision is to be the number one specialist terrorism insurer in the Asia region and to provide competitive insurance solutions for what can be and often is a catastrophic and devastating loss event for any business.
He adds: Our mission will be to explain why this cover is needed and why it plays a vital part in risk mitigation for any business, large or small.
At the Annual General Meeting today of The Association of Medical Insurance Intermediaries (AMII), Wayne Pontin was appointed chairman.
Pontin was a member of the AMII executive committee from 2007 to 2010 and is currently Sales Director (West) of Jelf Employee Benefits. He succeeds Andrew Tripp, who has been AMII’s chairman for the last two years.
Tripp also steps down from the executive committee having been a member since March 2007, including serving as AMII’s treasurer.
Other AMII changes include the appointment of Brian Walters from Regency Health as vice chair and two new committee members, Stuart Scullion from The Private Health Partnership and Sue Smith from Health Care Plus.
Burdened by budget deficits, states are cutting health programs to the chagrin of some. But others say the economic downturn has allowed states to take up long-term economic problems they wouldn’t have addressed otherwise.
The Wall Street Journal: States Keep Axes Sharpened States are moving to cut jobs and other spending to close budget deficits, even though their protracted fiscal crisis is easing a bit in an improving economy. … But other economists more critical of government spending say the fiscal challenges of recent years helped states by forcing them to confront long-term problems, such as rising pension and health care costs, that they had avoided for years. S
The insurance operations of XL Group plc have announced that Roland Brandt has been appointed to the post of property underwriting manager of Risk Management, Analytics and Innovation in the International region.
In his new position Brandt is to be based in Munich, and will report directly to Chief Underwriting Officer, International Property Matthias Horntrich.
Before joining XL he worked for Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty as head of risk consulting in Germany and Central Europe.
In his new role Brandt is tasked with the co-ordination and leadership of International Property insurance business regarding risk assessment, leveraging client industry expertise, best in class risk management and innovation.
He will also be charged with improving the way that analytical information is utilised during the underwriting decision process.
Horntrich said that the appointment reflected the importance of investing in analytical and industry-specific capabilities.