Cebuana Lhuillier Insurance Solutions (CLIS), the country’s dominant microinsurance company, yesterday launched “Microinsurance-On-Wheels” for as low as P25 to far flung communities and claims processing within 24-hours in its over 1,500 branches, which are expected to shore up its policy holders to 5 million this year.
Jonathan D. Batangan, CLIS general manager, said they are eyeing to insure a million Filipinos this year to bring its total number of insured under the Alagang Cebuana program to 5 million this year.
Batangan told reporters that as of last year, they have sold a total of 12 million certificates of insurance reflecting a total of 4 million Filipinos insured or three or four insurance policies per person.
Since May this year, Cebuana Lhuillier has averaged 1.2 million insurance sales a month.
It has also settled more than P20 million claims in 2012. To date, it has already settled P75 million in total claims.
Through the Microinsurance on Wheels, CLIS aims to heighten microinsurance awareness among the low-income and vulnerable sectors and make affordable and quality insurance protection available to ordinary Filipinos using eight mobile hubs that will travel around the country.
Batangan said they will partner with local government units up to the barangay units to provide insurance to the remote places.
“This unique initiative will reach out to poor Filipinos, especially those from far-flung areas, to inform and educate them on the importance and advantages of microinsurance thus complementing the global campaign to promote microinsurance as an effective tool for social protection and financial inclusion,” he said.
Under this new unique initiative, the Microinsurance on Wheels will initially offer the Alagang Cebuana Plus – a personal accident with fire-cash assistance protection underwritten by the country’s largest insurer, Malayan Insurance. Customers are entitled to the P20,000 accidental death/dismemberment benefit and the P5,000 fire-cash aid per Insurance Certificate for as low as P25, valid for four months. A maximum of five certificates can be purchased.
A P75 can provide insurance cover for a year.
“This is cheaper than buying one-piece Jollibee chicken,” said Batangan.
In addition, claims can be processed and released within 24 hours in any of the over 1,500 Cebuana Lhuillier branches nationwide.
In fact, Batangan reported that they have distributed insurance claims to 200 households who were affected by typhoon Pablo in Compostela Valley even if their insurance coverage did not include devastation caused by floods.
Batangan further said that Cebuana Lhuillier is also looking at other variants of their Microinsurance on Wheels to include calamities like earthquake and other acts of nature.
Insurance Commissioner Emmanuel Dooc noted at the event that there are 7.8 million Filipinos out of the estimated 27 million living below poverty line have availed of microinsurance.
Dooc expressed hope that the aggressive launch of the Alaga Cebuana microinsurance programs would further provide more opportunities for Filipinos to avail of small insurance coverage.
At present, total insurance coverage in the country is only a little over 1 percent of the country’s GDP.
But Dooc said that insurance premiums now comprise 7.5 percent of the daily minimum wage of non-agricultural sector in Metro Manila, an improvement from 5 percent. This would translate to P23 to P24 of daily premium
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