National Insurance Company is planning to come out with a new product that may enable it to extend coverage to HIV positive and AIDS patients.
“This has been discussed and we are planning to come out with a new product,” Chairman and Managing Director NSR Chandraprasad said.
On the settlement of the fire claims of the AMRI Hospital, Dhakuria, where a fire in December 2011 took many lives, he said that NIC representatives were allowed to enter the premises only two weeks ago and they were now assessing the situation.
Mr. Chandraprasad, who was talking to the media after participating in an interactive session organised by the Merchants Chamber of Commerce, said that there seemed to be need for some sort of regulation in the health insurance sector so that hospitals could be made to do reasonable pricing. “This would benefit the common man,” he said.
S. K. Bhattacharyya, General Manager, said recently, the company has begun recruiting doctors to help clients availing themselves of the cashless facility. “We plan to hire 30 doctors who will visit hospitals to check whether the line of treatment is alright and whether the claims are justified.”
To suggestions from MCC members that NIC had stopped renewing fire insurance policies from the jute and the plastics industries, Kuldip Singh, Director and General Manager, said that while this was not the case, the fact remained that these age-old industries needed to tone up their operations and installations.
Mr. Chandraprasad said business growth rate was good and a Rs.9,500-crore business was being targeted for 2012-13 against Rs.7,800 crore last fiscal.
