Insurance firms with pre-need arms monitored by IC

Insurance companies with pre-need businesses have been put in the watchlist to make sure they are not making inappropriate advances, the Insurance Commission (IC) said yesterday.

IC chairman Benjamin Cruz said yesterday that Great Pacific Life, Malayan Insurance, CAP Life Insurance, CAP General Insurance and other insurance companies with pre-need businesses will be monitored closely to ensure that there will be no spill-over of the problems in the pre-need industry.

According to Santos, the IC has so far not detected any problems in the insurance companies but regulators wanted to be able to anticipate developing problems if they happen.

GrepaLife and Malayan are the insurance companies of the Yuchengco Group while CAP Life and CAPGen are both subsidiaries of the troubled College Assurance Plan (CAP).

The problems of CAP and the Yuchengco-owned Pacific Plans Inc (PPI) have spawned fears that their parent companies and related businesses would be adversely affected by their financial woes.

Specifically, planholders fear that the insurance companies and other related interests would be forced to make advances to the pre-need companies in order to help bail them out of their troubles.

According to Santos, however, the IC has already looked into the operations and finances of insurance companies with related pre-need businesses and saw nothing amiss.

Under its mandate, Santos said insurance companies under its jurisdiction are required to seek the approval of the commission before they make investments in their related businesses.

"They can make investments but they have to get our permission and we can stop it," he said. "As far as I know, no transaction of such nature has been presented to us for approval."

"Principally, we check the advances being made by the insurance companies and we have to make sure they are not doing it to the point that puts the company at risk," Santos said. "So far, we have not seen any."

Just the same, Santos said insurance companies with related pre-need businesses have been put under a tight watch to ensure they are fully compliant with all their fiduciary obligations.