Justanupdate
Monday5thAugust
Thisweek'sheadlines:
2025 Lender Fayre – Wednesday 2nd April 2025
We are delighted to confirm that our 2025 Lender Fayre is confirmed and what a venue we have secured!
The Forest of Arden Hotel & Country Club will be hosting our Lender Fayre on the 2nd April 2025 with a host of exciting plans to make it our best event yet.
This resort complex is a world class venue, having hosted many high profile conference events and is also synonymous in the world of golf. The Forest of Arden has two golf courses and has been the venue for many prestigious tournaments, including European Tour events, the British Masters on three occasions, and the English Open four times. We are certain this venue will be brilliant hosts!
Keep an eye out for a “Hold the Date” tomorrow and we will be providing much more information as we count down to the event
Improvement to Royal London Workaround
Whilst Openwork and Royal London continue to work on a complete solution to the issue of the Waiver cost and plan fee being separated out of the total premium, there is now an improved workaround that is immediately available to you:
1) Import the Royal London quote as normal
2) When recommending the quote amend the benefit premiums to take into account the costs that were separated out. (Plan fee in all cases £2.60 and cost of Waiver if selected) ll update as the benefits are karound is no longer needed.
RSA withdrawing from the UK GI Personal Lines Market
As a result of RSA’s withdrawal, we’ve been informed that the Classic back book with Paymentshield and a back book for Simple Home & Protect that was moved to Third Party Administrator, Uris back in 2018, are both moving to new insurers.
Classic Book - Paymentshield
The Classic back book with Paymentshield is moving to Ageas starting with policy renewals from July 2024 and Paymentshield have begun to contact affected customers.
As part of this change, policyholders who renew their existing policy will retain all the existing benefits their original policy offered but they will receive increased cover levels with Buildings cover increasing to £1million for both Home and Landlord’s policies, cover for contents increasing to £75k and the addition of £10k of trace and access cover.
Tables of Changes for Home Insurance and Landlords Insurance shows the details of the difference in cover between the RSA Classic Home product and the new Ageas product.
The transition is expected to be seamless for policyholders who’ll keep their current policy reference number and will receive full details of the change of their insurer with their policy anniversary documentation.
Ageas are one of the largest car and home insurers in the UK and therefore this change marks the beginning of an exciting new partnership between Paymentshield and Ageas. There will be further benefits to their relationship with Paymentshield with product and service enhancements scheduled for later this year.
If you wish to contact your customers regarding the move, you can identify Classic policies in Paymentshield’s Adviser Hub. Simply go to Policies in the top menu and select Live policies. You can sort by start date order by clicking on the Policy Start Date heading. Policies with a start date before July 2016 are Classic policies. You can also check by looking at the policy number; Classic policy numbers don’t start with BPNL / LPNL. You can export the list of policies by selecting the EXPORT: CSV/PDF option above the table on the right-hand side.
With regard to commission the move is not a new policy, it’s the same policy continuing with a different insurer; therefore, commission is payable at the current renewal rate. As a reminder commission is only payable from the original start date of the policy for a maximum of 10 years.
For further information contact Paymentshield’s Broker Support team on 0345 0615 100.
Simple Home & Protect Household - Uris
The second back book is the Simple Home and Protect Household book, which was insured by RSA and transferred by Paymentshield in June 2018 to Third Party Administrator, Uris. Uris only process renewals for these customers, there are no new policies pre-2018.
Uris have advised us that a communication was sent with firms’ commission statements advising that with RSA’s exit from the retail home insurance market, they have had many discussions with the Managing General Agent (MGA), Midas and the new insurer, Zurich, with regards to the FCA Product Oversight and Governance “PROD” rules. In particular, their fair value assessments have been focusing on which parties are involved in the insurance chain, and to ensure the levels of remuneration are appropriate based on the work carried out.
As a result, Uris have been instructed to limit the amount of commission paid to parties not involved in the actual administration of the contracts to 10% on an ongoing basis. This change will take effect as policies renew from 1st July 2024. If you require more information or would like a list of policies coming up for renewal, please contact Uris on 01302 897432
4factsyoumightnotknowaboutVitality's Optimiser
TheideaofOptimiserissimple.Yourclientscanenjoythebenefitsofa lifetimeofhealthychoicesupfront,throughourbestavailablepremium. Plus,theywillhaveaccesstodiscountsandrewardsfromourrangeof partnersthroughtheVitalityProgramme.
DiscoverwhyOptimisercouldbenefitmoreclientsthanyouthink:
1.ClientswithOptimiseraremorelikelytostay: They’realsothreetimesmorelikelytoengagewiththeirplan,which meanstheygetmorevaluefromtheircover.And,iftheydoengage, they’reupto46%lesslikelytolapse.1
2.Clientsaremorelikelytotakeoutmorethanoneproduct: Asclientsgetupto30%offourstandardpremium,theyoftenusethis savingtoaddadditionalcover.Infact,they're78%morelikelytotake outmorethanoneproduct.1
3.Clientscansavemoneyovertime: EvenVitalitymemberswhostayonBronzestatusearnalmost£200a year,onaverage,inVitalitysavingsandrewards.1
4.Optimisergivesyourclientscertainty: Unlikeplanswithage-relatedpremiums.Eveniftheydon'tengagewith theVitalityProgramme,theirpremiumwillonlyevergoupbya maximumof2.5%ayear,forexample,a£45premiumwouldonly increaseto£46.12
Check out Virgin Money’s ‘Stay Tuned’ series
In this final episode of the series, Virgin Money look at how it supports self-employed clients. Cat McNeil, one of Virgin Money’s National Account Manager’s, talks through Virgin Money’s lending approach for self-employed, limited company directors and also how Virgin Money’s BDM team are on hand to help you understand what income figures it can use.
Don’t forget that Virgin Money’s team of BDM’s also have direct access to underwriters available and so with more complex scenarios Virgin Money will take a view – it's all part of Virgin Money saying ‘Yes’ to More.
The video can be watched on Linkedin or You Tube using the following links: YouTube
For full details of Virgin Money’s criteria, useful guides, downloads and forms plus details of your BDM please visit https://intermediaries.virginmoney.com/find-your-bdm/
