Protection

Key to the creation of Royal Liver's new virtual life company was from early creation dependent on its technology capabilities.

Royal Liver Assurance is just weeks away from launching the UK's first virtual life office and a new distribution channel targeting IFAs.

Eighteen months ago, Royal Liver Life Assurance executives effectively gave one man a blank piece of paper and simply said "create a new life company aimed at the IFA market".

After three years and 27 downgrades in a row for UK insurers, Standard & Poor's has revised its ratings outlook for the sector as a whole up to ‘stable' from ‘negative'.

European Commission proposals to ban the use of gender in setting insurance rates should be rejected until it is proven that EU consumers would benefit from such a move, a Lords committee says.

Figures presented by Pafs suggest Conservative Party proposals to reform residential or long-term care funding could cut the cost of premiums by around a third.

Opposition party talk of residential long-term care reform has raised the spectre of LTC insurance, and what must currently be done to assess whether State support is available.

The Conservative Party has revealed plans to introduce a new long-term care scheme if elected to government at next year's general election.

Nine out of ten policyholders diagnosed with a critical illness would like some form of additional practical and emotional support from a nurse or counsellor at the point of claim, suggests research by Bright Grey.

To bypass high premiums and still get private healthcare treatment, self pay is increasingly popular among the over 50s. Rachel Gordon reports