Insurance Day Asia
JAPAN’S FSA PROBES ACCIDENT INSURANCE MARKETING
Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) is looking into the way that personal accident policies have been promoted by certain
life assurers, reports
Nikkei
. Life companies are said to have pushed the policies to companies by emphasising the tax advantages of the policies, claiming
that the premiums would be 100% tax-deductible. However, the National Tax Agency stated in November 2005 that it would not
approve the posting of premiums as losses, since this could lead to profit manipulation. The FSA began its investigation after
several companies complained that they were not receiving the tax benefits that they had been promised by the life assurers
selling the policies. Personal accident is a whole-of-life policy which pays out when corporate executives or other employees
die from accidents or are hospitalised after a disaster. Some 10 companies offer such a policy, with the total number in issue
estimated at 400,000 by the end of the last financial year on March 31.