IRDAI will soon announce a new set of regulations to govern insurance brokers.
“[New] broker regulations will be coming any time... we have sent the gazette for publication,” Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India Chairman T.S.Vijayan told the 14th annual summit of Insurance Brokers Association of India here on Wednesday.
The regulations, he added, would answer several “questions brokers had placed before us”. The norms would cover issues concerning ownership and partnership, he said. The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (Insurance Brokers) Regulations, 2013, are to be replaced by the new regulations.
Mr. Vijayan said this while highlighting the role of brokers in improving insurance penetration. People had to be made aware of the benefits of insurance. The policies have to be bought as opposed to being sold, he emphasised.
Wider acceptance
To queries from the media, he said insurance business was growing very well, across life, non-life and even health verticals. The Centre’s initiatives such as crop insurance and Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Yojana had also “generated positive attitude in the people towards insurance.”
‘Eventful tenture’
Mr. Vijayan, who will demit office on February 21, said his tenure was quite “eventful” mainly because of changes to the Insurance Act, especially those allowing up to 49% foreign participation in the companies and according nod for reinsurance branches.
The latter had given a boost to the reinsurance scenario, he said, mentioning how previously a lot of the business was going outside India. With 7-8 reinsurers setting up branches in the country, “I believe it will be retained within India,” he added. The challenges for the regulator, he said, would be about adopting technology and digitisation of the insurance process for the benefit of the customers.
Digitisation would allow for a reduction in cost, improving the reach to the customer and usher in custom-made products using analytic tools, he said.
On whether there was any unfinished agenda, he said, “A person should always be dissatisfied with the growth he has [achieved], that’s [the] unfinished agenda.”
Insurance Brokers Association of India president Sanjay Kedia said the gross domestic premium (non-life) contribution by insurance brokers was ₹30,442 crore in 2016-17. There were 428 insurance brokers in the country.
