The insurer’s chief executive for UK and international admits that ‘perfect information’ is not needed ‘to make part payments’
RSA, which is now owned by Canadian insurer Intact Financial Corporation and Danish insurer Tryg A/S, has so far paid more than £80m for UK-based Covid-19-related claims, according to chief executive for UK and international Scott Egan.
Speaking to trade press at the end of last week, Egan confirmed that £50m of this £80m total regards claims relating to the FCA’s test case on business interruption (BI) insurance, which progressed through the High Court and Supreme Court from summer 2020 to January 2021.
Referencing this tally, Egan said: “You can see the progress that we’ve made. You can see us month-on-month make significant inroads into that.
“Our intention is really clear – we want to pay the valid claims as quickly as we possibly can and, therefore, we’re working with our customers to achieve that.”
In terms of assessing BI claims made by RSA policyholders, Egan added that the insurer is working closely with its customers here because it appreciates that “it’s difficult for them to provide information and we’re trying to be as helpful as we possibly can in that process”.
He continued: “We’re trying to make interim payments, which we definitely are, as we’re going along, recognising that we don’t always need perfect information to make part payments.
“We’re trying to be as flexible as we possibly can.”
Punctual payouts
On 12 May, the FCA published its latest statistics around insurers’ business interruption claims payouts.
This found that as of 5 May 2021, the aggregate value of interim or initial payments for the 3,632 currently unsettled claims is £268,248,492.
Meanwhile, final settlements have been agreed for 13,895 BI claims – this amounts to a value of £433,125,666.
This means that so far, 17,527 BI policyholders out of the 36,414 who have had their claims accepted have received at least an interim payment.
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