• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
CAFII | The Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance

Making Insurance Simple and Accessible for Canadians

  • Français
| Member Login
  • Français
  • Insurance
    • Close
    • Insurance
    • Mortgage Disability & Critical Illness Insurance
    • What is Travel Insurance?
    • What is Life Insurance for Personal Loans and Lines of Credit?
    • What is Disability Insurance for Personal Loans and Lines of Credit?
    • What is Credit Protection Insurance?
    • What is Mortgage Disability Insurance?
    • What is Travel Medical Insurance?
    • What is Credit Payment Protection Insurance for Personal Loans?
    • What is Credit Card Insurance?
    • What is Mortgage Life Insurance?
    • What is Mortgage Critical Illness Insurance?
    • What are Trip Cancellation and Trip Interruption Insurance?
    • What is Critical Illness Insurance for Personal Loans and Lines of Credit?
    • What is Job Loss Insurance?
    • Other Insurance
    • Close
  • Tools & Resources
    • Close
    • FAQ
    • Enquiries and Complaints
    • Helpful Links
    • How To Make A Claim
    • Close
  • About CAFII
  • News & Events
    • Close
    • News
    • Events
    • Close
  • Research & Insights
    • Close
    • Research
    • Insights
    • Close
  • Contact Us

cafiiadmin

Sharing insurance insights with our stakeholders

January 9, 2023 by cafiiadmin

By Brendan Wycks, Co-Executive Director, CAFII.

CAFII hosts a number of webinars each year that allow us to share insights into a range of insurance topics that are of interest to our stakeholders. These stakeholders include leaders from the insurance industry, regulatory authorities, research companies, the legal community, insurance associations, and government.

Over the past two years, our webinars have included presentations, chats and panel discussions about:

  • Best practices in the digitization of credit protection insurance;
  • The impact of the pandemic on mental health challenges in the workplace, at home, and in society;
  • Consumers’ insurance and financial services preferences and related product development insights;
  • How principles-based regulation and rule-making authority can work together;
  • The ins and outs of life insurers’ health and wellness incentivization programs;
  • Provincial insurance policy and regulatory priorities and issues arising as Canada emerges from COVID-19;
  • Climate change and its implications for life and health insurance; and,
  • Future travel trends and issues as the world emerges from COVID-19; and more.

The objective of our webinars is to provide a forum where important issues can be discussed, new information shared, and different points of view expressed.  As an Association, we believe our stakeholders benefit when they have a common appreciation for the challenges facing our industry, are exposed to a range of perspectives, and have a good understanding of how we can all work together to meet the evolving needs of insurance consumers.

Since mid-2020, we have hosted more than 20 webinars, and have been attracting between 60 to 120 participants to each session. This represents a healthy increase in attendance over CAFII sessions held prior to the arrival of COVID-19, when all of our presentations and panels were held in-person, which made it more challenging for people outside of Toronto to attend. By staging more webinars, we’ve also been able to address a wider diversity of topics in a shorter time frame.

For example, our webinar in May about how principles-based regulation and rule-making authority can work together attracted more than 100 people, including over 20 regulators and policy-makers from federal and provincial regulatory authorities across the country. They were treated to an excellent panel discussion that included two leading Canadian experts on the topic: Dr. Cristie Ford, who is a full-tenured Professor at the Peter A. Allard School of Law at UBC; and Stuart Carruthers who is a partner at law firm Stikeman Elliott. Among other things, the panelists discussed how principles-based regulation (PBR) could be viewed as a “changed approach” to regulation, how it makes sense in an environment where this is more change or complexity, and where one set of rules will not cover everything.  Mr. Carruthers said Canada was fortunate to have a very sophisticated group of regulators who have strong and transparent relationships with the industry, which he felt led to better regulatory outcomes.

The presentation in June by Deloitte Partner Melissa Carruthers and her colleague Marc Lewis about their study on best practices in the digitization of credit protection insurance in Canada was also a hit. More than 100 people attended the session, including excellent representation from regulators and policy-makers from B.C., Alberta, Quebec, Ontario, the Yukon and Nova Scotia. This session explored research undertaken by Deloitte which found a growing need for underwriters and distributors to digitize and improve the end-to-end Credit Protection Insurance client experience in order to keep pace with evolving consumer expectations.

And our webinar in November about post-COVID travel trends and issues also attracted over 100 participants, and featured several experts including Elliott Draga from the Travel Health Insurance Association of Canada, Sheila Burns from the Canadian Life and Health Insurance Association, Katia Umutoniwase, Head Of Sales Operations and Digital Enablement for Travel Insurance at Manulife, and David Moorcroft, a travel blogger. The panelists opined on a range of issues, including whether travel levels had fully recovered since the arrival of COVID-19, what if anything had changed about travel, and how travel health insurance, trip cancellation and baggage loss insurance had changed and improved in response to the pandemic and resurgent travel.

Many of our webinars also include opinion polls which give participants the opportunity to weigh in on relevant issues.

Finally, an additional benefit of our webinars is that they have been easy to record and post on our CAFII website so that people who missed the original webinar and poll results can go online and see them. You’ll find a catalogue of these webinars on the website under “Events”.

So, while we have returned to holding some in-person events at CAFII as COVID-19 restrictions have eased, our webinars have become and will remain an integral part of how we share insights and information with our stakeholders.

Filed Under: Insights

Two more educational videos added to CAFII website

October 4, 2022 by cafiiadmin

By Keith Martin, Co-Executive Director, CAFII.

I’m pleased to report that CAFII recently added two new educational videos to our website.

The first video is about Job Loss Credit Protection Insurance, and it is designed to help consumers better understand how this type of insurance works and who can apply for it. The second video explains certain helpful features about Credit Protection Insurance that consumers may want or need to use.

Job loss Credit Protection Insurance versus Job Loss Insurance

According to research by Pollara Strategic Insights, over the past three years there has been a significant increase in the number of Canadians purchasing Job Loss Credit Protection Insurance. It also happens to be the most highly searched topic on our CAFII website. That’s not surprising, especially given the job uncertainty created by COVID-19.

However, many people confuse Job Loss Insurance with Job Loss Credit Protection Insurance, which is just one of the reasons why we made the video.

The former, which is sometimes called supplemental unemployment insurance, provides temporary income if a full-time employee is laid-off from work. This type of insurance is difficult to find, and expensive to purchase.

In contrast, Job Loss Credit Protection Insurance covers some or all of the monthly payments on insured debt obligations for a specific period of time, or until the insured returns to work – whichever comes first – should a person involuntarily lose his/her full-time job.  This type of insurance is available from some financial institutions as an “add on” to life or disability insurance on mortgages and some types of personal loans. In some cases, it may also be added to balance protection coverage for credit cards.

Consumer friendly features of Credit Protection Insurance

As our video explains, CAFII members provide details about credit protection insurance to help consumers make informed decisions. This includes plain language information about products, online tools that provide pricing quotes, and trained representatives in branches and call centres who can answer questions.

CAFII members also provide information about helpful features of credit protection insurance that consumers may want or need to use. For example, customers have a “review” period, typically up to 30 days, during which they can cancel their coverage and receive a full refund of the premium paid.

If insured customers need to make a claim, CAFII members can help facilitate the claims process in person, by phone, or online.

The video also outlines the procedures in place for handling consumer enquiries and complaints, including what to do if someone is unhappy with the outcome.

Furthermore, the video notes that recent updates to Canada’s financial consumer protection framework have reinforced measures by CAFII members to ensure fair treatment of customers.

These two videos are the latest in a series aimed at simplifying insurance products and services for Canadian consumers. They supplement eight other informative videos on the CAFII website, with more still to come.

Filed Under: Insights

Report outlines the challenges of keeping pace with Canadians’ insurance needs

July 2, 2022 by cafiiadmin

Insurance Portal reports on a CAFII-commissioned study by Deloitte of the evolving insurance needs of Canadians and their changing preferences, alongside an analysis of what it takes to offer best-in-class digital experiences to consumers.

Read More

Filed Under: CAFII News, News

What will it take to offer best in class digital experiences to consumers of CPI?

June 30, 2022 by cafiiadmin

London-based Retail Banker International reports that a key take-away from a recent CAFII commissioned study is that collaboration across distributors, underwriters and regulators of credit protection insurance is key to delivering a ‘best-in-class’ digital experience for Canadians.

Read More

Filed Under: CAFII News, News

What Will it Take to Offer ‘Best-in-Class’ Digital Experiences to Consumers of Credit Protection Insurance?

June 29, 2022 by cafiiadmin

New report outlines challenges and opportunities for financial institutions in keeping pace with the evolving insurance needs and preferences of Canadians

TORONTO – New research has found that collaboration across distributors, underwriters and regulators of Credit Protection Insurance (CPI) is key to delivering the type of “best-in-class” digital experience that Canadian consumers have increasingly come to expect.

The Deloitte Canada report, commissioned by the Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance (CAFII), says digitization is at the heart of the insurance industry’s most prominent and disruptive trends, which requires the industry to respond with new and innovative business models and customer experiences. The report identifies four key trends that are driving the need to transform the insurance business in ways that are truly more digital:

  • Consumers expect more seamless, convenient, and personalized digital experiences from their insurers;
  • There is growing competition from new entrants with tech-enabled business models;
  • There are opportunities to create greater efficiency in back-office operations; and,
  • The increased availability of data and use of advanced analytics has made it possible to generate greater customer insights.

In order to offer a leading digital experience, the report says that insurers will need to exhibit six attributes and underlying capabilities:

  • Have a well articulated business digital strategy with clarity on supporting the customer, product, and channel strategy;
  • Be highly customer-oriented in how they do business and take a human-centered design approach to their end-to-end user journey and digital experience;
  • Become hyper-focused on operational efficiency, optimizing investments and data through process automation and digitization;
  • Inform business priorities, product development, and customer experiences based on data-driven insights;
  • Utilize modern technology architecture to support flexibility, seamless integration, and speed to market;
  • Embed digital culture, skills, and ways of working throughout the organization which drive a holistic culture of innovation.

According to the report, there are unique challenges facing the CPI industry in Canada, accentuated by the multiple stakeholders involved including underwriters, distributors, and regulators. For example, the CPI digital experience is highly dependent upon the future lending journey (i.e., mortgages, loans) where most sales take place, and the regulatory environment can be difficult to navigate digitally, especially due to lack of harmonization across provinces.

Despite the challenges, the CPI industry is committed to keeping pace with client expectations, with 100% of CAFII members surveyed by Deloitte indicating that digitizing CPI is a top strategic priority for their company, and 43% saying up to 40% of their applications will be fully digital by 2025. Furthermore, distributors of CPI recognize the need for greater omni-channel alignment, with 86% stating that cross channel integration is a key for creating successful digital CPI experiences.

“While the digital expectations of insurance consumers have been evolving for a while, the pandemic was a turning point for accelerating digital maturity in the Credit Protection Insurance industry,” said Keith Martin, Co-Executive Director of the Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance (CAFII). “Consumers of CPI expect a ‘best-in-class’ digital experience, and our members are committed to working with all of our stakeholders to deliver that outcome.”

“Offering digital-enabled experiences for clients, sales representatives and employees is no longer a choice. To effectively meet the needs of CPI clients and attract or retain top talent, the distributors of CPI in Canada will need to think thoughtfully about how and where it prioritizes its digital investment in collaboration with its lending and underwriting partners,” said Melissa Carruthers, Partner and Leader of Deloitte Canada’s Life & Health Insurance Strategy & Transformation Practice.

The Deloitte report is the latest in a series of studies commissioned by CAFII over the past seven years that have looked at customer satisfaction with CPI and Travel Insurance, and how its members can keep pace with evolving consumer expectations.

Over the past decade consumers of financial services have been shifting more of their transactions to digital channels, and this trend accelerated during the pandemic. In fact, the vast majority of Canadian consumers with CPI who participated in a Pollara Strategic Insights survey last year said their experience during COVID-19 had made them more comfortable conducting financial transactions online, with most saying it had changed the way they want to conduct these transactions in future.

About CAFII: The Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance is a not-for-profit industry Association dedicated to the development of an open and flexible insurance marketplace. CAFII believes that consumers are best served when they have meaningful choice in the purchase of insurance products and services. CAFII’s 15 members include the insurance arms of Canada’s major financial institutions – BMO Insurance; CIBC Insurance; Desjardins Insurance; National Bank Insurance; RBC Insurance; ScotiaLife Financial; and TD Life Insurance Company; along with major industry players Assurant Canada; The Canada Life Assurance Company; Canadian Premier Life Insurance Company; Canadian Tire Bank; CUMIS Services Incorporated; Manulife (The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company); Sun Life; and Valeyo.

Media contact for CAFII:                                         

David Moorcroft

Email: david@strategy2communications.com

Tel: 416-727-1858

Filed Under: CAFII News, News

Industry appointments of the week

June 26, 2022 by cafiiadmin

Investment Executive summarizes major appointments across the financial industry, including the election of Peter D. Thompson as Chair of CAFII.

Read More

Filed Under: CAFII News, News

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 10
  • Go to Next Page »
CAFII | The Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance
  • Insurance
  • About CAFII
  • News & Research
  • Tools & Resources
  • Contact Us

Privacy & Security | Terms Of Use | Accessibility | Canadian Association of Financial Institutions in Insurance, © 2023