The life insurance sector has reported unclaimed amounts totalling `20,062 crore as of March 2024, according to the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI).
IRDAI said unclaimed amounts of life insurers at the beginning of the FY2023-24 was Rs 22,237 crore. “In order to reduce the unclaimed amounts, expedite refunds to consumers and to contain the further accumulation of unclaimed amounts with the insurers, a special drive was initiated by IRDAI for a period of 6 months during June 2023 to November 2023 and the progress of clearance of unclaimed amounts lying with the life insurers during this period was monitored on a monthly basis,” the regulator said in its annual report.
A net reduction of `1,018.23 crore was witnessed in respect of life insurers during this special drive period, it said.
“For the benefit of consumers, modification to ‘Master circular on Unclaimed Amount’s was issued on February 16, 2024 for proper identification and efficient disbursement of the unclaimed amounts, modifying few definitions including that of ‘unclaimed amount’ and suggested measures for adoption by insurers towards reduction of existing unclaimed amounts and to contain further accumulation of the unclaimed amounts,” IRDAI said.
The life insurance industry paid total benefits of `5.77 lakh crore in 2023-24 which constitutes 70.22 per cent of the net premium. The benefits paid on account of surrenders/ withdrawals increased by 15.29 per cent to `2.29 lakh crore in 2023-24 of which public sector life insurer accounted for 58.36 per cent, it said.
Meanwhile, death claims paid by life insurance companies were at `48,512 crore during the year ended March 2024 as against `46,380 crore in the previous year.
This included `28,868 crore under the individual business and `19,644 crore in the group business, IRDAI Annual Report said.
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