Insurers are not there for claimants when they need them most, according to research by Sunsuper.
Speaking at the AIA Vitality summit on Tuesday, Sunsuper executive general manager for customer experience and insights, Teifi Whatley, said there was a lot the industry needed to do in terms of providing better service for customers.
Whatley said the fund’s survey found two-thirds of total and permanent disability (TPD) claimant respondents wanted their fund to help with retraining in order to get back to work.
“About one-third of claimants spent money on medical assistance and other sorts of services to get back to work, and a one-third of those are either back at work or actively looking for work,” she said.
“So there’s a very definite relationship there that people don’t want to be away from work.
“One of the comments that came out was that ‘when I needed you most you left me’ because we’d paid out the claim and they were on their own.”
Whatley said insurers needed to be thinking about how to get people back to work.
“We all know there are enormous benefits of being active at work and if we can get people back to work and off claim and earning money, then they will have a better retirement lifestyle,” she said.
“I’d like to see a much more holistic approach to health and wealth and in fact bringing those things together much more closely so that we think about them in totality.
“…because for us as an industry most of what we do is people at work and getting them ready for after work.”
