The office of the Insurance ombudsman in Chandigarh has received maximum number of complaints against insurance companies from Punjab for the year 2011-12.
The body is set up by finance ministry. It is responsible for the reconciliation or settlement of grievances between complainants and insurance companies. This office is authorized to receive complaints from Haryana, Punjab, Chandigarh, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir.
For the year 2011-12 it received total 2,383 complaints as against 2,082 in 2010-11. Out of these 1,678 were against private sector insurers and 705 were against public sector insurers.
The complaints in life segment increased to 1,782 this year as against 1,268 last year. However, number of complaints in non-life segment decreased to 601 this year as compared to 814 last year.
Almost 91% of the complaints were received from Punjab followed by Haryana and Chandigarh.
Total 1,885 complaints were disposed off by the insurance ombudsman this year, including 254 cases of outstation hearings, as against the total 1,143 complaints which had been disposed off last year.
The average cost per complaint stood at Rs 3,342 in 2011-12 as compared to Rs 4,870 in 2010-11.
Of total cases reaching the office, 1,335 complaints found to be not entertainable and out of remaining 1,048, 78% were settled either by insurers themselves or by the way of the awards passed by the office.
The maximum number of complaints from Chandigarh were disputes involving premium paid or payable according to terms and conditions of the policy, these stood at 1,258. This was followed by 270 complaints regarding the partial or total repudiation of claims by an insurer.
There were 216 complaints pertaining to delay in settlement of claims by insurance companies.
The annual report 2011-12 of the insurance ombudsman highlighted common issues related to overwriting and customer service. These included the active involvement of the insured at the time of filling up of the form by being properly briefed about the terms and conditions of the policy.
The report also proposed that insurers say that customers should not hand over the cash premiums to the agent and they need to personalize their agents to avoid the wrongful selling of policies.
The report stated that most complaints arose due to unethical selling and unprofessional conduct of agents and observed that the insurance companies were not adhering to Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority’s (IRDA) agency guidelines, resulting in an increased number of complaints.
