Digital distribution

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has published a final rule, with a comment period, establishing health insurers' "medical loss ratios," including provisions to account for ICD-10 conversion costs.

CGI Federal Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of Canada-based CGI Group, announced that it has been awarded a $93.7 million contract by The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight (CCIIO) to build the U.S. government’s federal health insurance exchange.

Life insurers need to craft mitigation strategies for a prolonged low-rate environment.

Commercial lines carriers focused on risk mitigation tied to business continuity have reason for additional concern. According to a newly published survey, 85 percent of companies reported at least one supply chain disruption over the last 12 months, with 40 percent of analyzed disruption originating below the immediate supplier. The survey, sponsored by Zurich Financial Services Group (Zurich) and conducted by the Business Continuity Institute (BCI) Caversham, United Kingdom, queried companies from across 62 countries.

Foreign insurers are meeting a wall of resistance as they try to penetrate the Chinese market, new analysis from Moody's indicates.

Sponsored by Swiss Re, a new report from the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) finds risk management practices surrounding renewable energy projects wanting.

JHPInsite.com, an insurance quote engine technology company and off-shoot of Health One Insurance Agency, found that “35 percent of website visitors clicking for information on additional products that are entirely different than what they were initially looking for." To address unpredictable shoppers, the vendor has developed a cross-sale platform enabling insurance brokers to place any product they wish into the quote engine environment for prospective clients.

Needs analyses and face-to-face contact greatly improve the odds of closing life insurance sales, according to a new study from LIMRA.

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners voted to exclude broker commissions from calculations of medical loss ratio required under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has issued its first rebuke to an insurer under the federal rate review provision of the Affordable Care Act.

Document output management product boasts ability to provide businesses with customized, automated correspondence.

Roughly two-thirds of life and annuity producers surveyed by Deloitte (http://www.deloitte.com) expect to change carriers within the next 12 months. Twenty-nine percent plan to add carriers and one-third expect to both add and drop carriers. Sales support, speed of underwriting and policy issue, and carrier brand are the top factors influencing these decisions. Forty percent are not satisfied with the support they currently receive. And, with more than 80 percent of a producer’s total compensation coming from two favored carriers, there is room for improved producer loyalty and sales through better support, said Rebecca Amoroso, vice chairman, Deloitte LLP and insurance leader.

Despite slow growth when compared to second-quarter figures, increases in year-to-year annuity sales remain strong.

Suite to replace multi-system legacy environment with single system for processing of all products.

As ubiquitous as business analytics have become, they are only optimized when matched with the right analytic talent.

About a week ago, Prudential released preliminary survey results indicating that when shopping for retirement plans, consumers between the ages of 18 and 36 were more interested than those over age 45 in guaranteed income features. The company is leveraging these results with additional features, including security, to certain plans offered by Prudential Retirement.

A competition to spur mobile app ideas produced 175 submissions from employees; the firm recently launched the winner.

New report American Medical Association finds a lack of competition in the commercial health insurance market.

Arizona regulators this week seized control of the troubled mortgage insurance division of PMI Group.

Prudential survey offers insights into young adults’ wants and needs when planning for retirement.