In order to protect the legitimate rights and interests of policyholders, insureds and beneficiaries, standardize insurance sales behavior, and unify the regulatory requirements for insurance sales behavior, the State Administration of Financial Supervision recently issued the Measures for the Administration of Insurance Sales Behavior (hereinafter referred to as the "Sales Measures"), and the heads of relevant departments answered reporters' questions on relevant issues.
I. What is the background to the formulation of the Sales Measures?
A: Insurance sales directly affect the rights and interests of insurance consumers, and in recent years, regulators have received a large number of complaints about disputes caused by irregular insurance sales. Through the Sales Measures, it is clarified who can sell insurance products, how to sell insurance products, and what obligations insurance institutions and insurance consumers should perform in the process of insurance sales, comprehensively standardize insurance sales from the front end, achieve source governance, and better protect the legitimate rights and interests of insurance consumers.
2. What are the main contents of the Sales Measures?
A: The Sales Measures consist of 6 chapters and 50 articles, which are general provisions, pre-sale behavior management, insurance sales behavior management, insurance post-sale behavior management, supervision and management, and supplementary provisions.
In the general provisions, the scope of application of these Measures, the principles and classification of insurance sales behavior, and the obligations of public education and information security protection that insurance companies and insurance intermediaries need to undertake. Chapters 2, 3 and 4 take the process of insurance sales as the main line and respectively stipulate the rules of conduct before, during and after insurance sales, of which Chapter 2 "Management of Pre-insurance Sales Behavior" mainly stipulates the scope of insurance sales business, insurance product information disclosure, insurance marketing and publicity behavior, as well as technical preparation, personnel preparation, channel preparation of insurance sales, etc.; Chapter III "Management of Conduct in Insurance Sales" mainly stipulates the obligation of insurance companies to inform, explain, inquire, prohibit compulsory tie-in sales, prohibit proxy signatures, etc.; Chapter IV "Management of Post-sale Conduct of Insurance" mainly stipulates the ancillary obligations of insurance companies arising from the conclusion of insurance contracts. Chapter V clarifies relevant regulatory requirements and stipulates administrative liability for violations of these Measures. The supplementary provisions stipulate the connection between these Measures and other regulatory systems, the interpretation of the Measures and the implementation time.
3. The Sales Measures divide insurance sales into three stages: pre-sale, sale and post-sale.
A: Insurance sales behavior is a series of activities carried out by insurance companies to achieve the conclusion of insurance contracts with policyholders, and it is a continuous behavior with a time span rather than a point-in-time behavior. In order to enable the supervised objects to have a clearer grasp of the requirements for the management of insurance sales behaviors, the Sales Measures divide insurance sales behaviors into pre-insurance sales acts, insurance sales behaviors and insurance sales behaviors.
Pre-sale insurance refers to the act of an insurance company and its entrusted insurance intermediaries and other institutions to create an environment, prepare conditions for the conclusion of an insurance contract, and solicit the counterparty of the insurance contract. Conduct in insurance sales refers to the act of an insurance company, insurance intermediaries and other institutions entrusted by it to communicate and negotiate the content of the insurance contract with a specific counterparty and make an offer and commitment. Post-sale insurance sales refers to the performance of insurance companies, insurance intermediaries and other institutions entrusted by them in performing ancillary obligations such as policy delivery, return visits, information notices, and file management arising from the conclusion of insurance contracts. Among them, the key points that distinguish between pre-insurance sales behavior and insurance sales behavior are: whether the counterparty of the insurance sales act is specific, and whether the insurance sales behavior has entered the stage of communication, negotiation, and making offers and commitments on the specific content of the insurance contract.
4. What are the reasons for establishing an insurance product description system in the Sales Measures?
Answer: As a legal document stipulating the rights and obligations of the parties to an insurance contract, insurance product clauses need to contain various elements stipulated by law, and the content is more and longer, and the contents that are directly related to their economic interests that the policyholder, the insured and the beneficiary are concerned about are scattered throughout the clause and are not easy to read and understand. The Sales Measures stipulate that insurance companies should publish insurance product descriptions on their official websites, focusing on the scope of protection, clauses exempting or mitigating insurers' liabilities, expected benefits, and the rights and obligations of policyholders, insureds and beneficiaries, so as to understand the core content of insurance product clauses when applicants, insureds and beneficiaries have limited attention; At the same time, it is stipulated that before the applicant applies for insurance, the insurance company, the insurance intermediary and the insurance sales personnel entrusted by the applicant shall provide the applicant with an explanation of the insurance product. This system is mainly intended to provide fuller positive information support for the protection of insurance consumers' right to know.
V. Consumers all want to buy insurance products that suit them, does the Sales Measures have relevant provisions to improve the suitability of products?
A: The Sales Measures put forward requirements for the appropriateness of insurance products from four perspectives. First, insurance companies are required to establish a hierarchical management system for insurance products, and classify and grade their insurance products according to the complexity of the products, the level of insurance premium burden, and the risk level of the policy benefits. The second is to require insurance companies and insurance intermediaries to support industry self-regulatory organizations to give full play to the advantages of the platform to promote the grading of sales capabilities of insurance salespersonnel, and establish a grading management system for insurance sales ability qualifications of their own institutions under the framework of sales capability grading formulated by industry self-regulatory organizations, taking the professional knowledge, sales ability, integrity level, and conduct status of insurance sales personnel as the main standards, and connect with the insurance company's insurance product hierarchical management system. Distinguish sales capabilities and qualifications, implement differential authorization, and clarify the insurance products that can be sold by insurance salespeople of each level to which they belong. Third, insurance companies, insurance intermediaries and insurance salespeople are required to recommend that the applicant terminate the insurance application when they find that the applicant is not suitable for a certain insurance product when selling insurance. Fourth, it is required that during the sales process, the applicant shall sign or confirm the insurance statement, insurance reminder, explanation of the clause exempting or mitigating the insurer's liability, and relevant documents and materials stipulated by the supervision in writing or other forms that can be preserved. (SAMR website)