Looking Back: COVID-19 pandemic drives demand for term, medical insurance

The insurance industry was forced to adopt the digital route to sell policies from April 2020 as field agents had to start working from home amidst the Coronavirus outbreak.

M Saraswathy

December 29, 2020 / 03:10 PM IST

The coronavirus outbreak led to a rise in awareness of the need to have term insurance and health insurance. After a brief lull in business in April and May due to low disposable income among customers and distribution-related hiccups, the insurance industry started seeing a revival in premium collection from June 2020 onwards.

Insurers started to sell fully online from May onwards. Health insurers gained big as high medical costs drove customers to buying medical insurance products.

- Driven by COVID-19 needs, health beat motor to become largest non-life insurance segment
- Standard policies launched for health insurance and Coronavirus. Term plans to be next.

- Virtual sales become the new normal as field agents move online.

Insurance04122020

Infographics by Ritesh Presswala

M Saraswathy is a business journalist with 10 years of reporting experience. Based in Mumbai, she covers consumer durables, insurance, education and human resources beat for Moneycontrol.

TAGS: #Business #coronavirus #Economy #insurance #Year-ender 2020

first published: Dec 29, 2020 03:10 pm