If the plan by the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) to fish out insurance brokers who are not practising the profession the way it should be is eventually carried out, the insuring public and policy holder will be happier for it.

This is because the issues of fake insurance policies, delays in payment of claims, non-remittance of premium and unidentified operators would be a thing of the past.

And in the future, the public would be rest assured that the insurance policies they have is geniune and in the event of claims, there would be a reprieve as quickly as possible. 

Before now, the market regulator has been uncomfortable with regulating over 400 insurance brokers, to whom many are mere passive operators.

According to a source at NAICOM, many of the players came into the business by chance, may be because one of their brothers became a minister and has asked them to register a brokerage firm just to corner the insurances of that ministry. And when the minister leaves office, the company becomes a paper company and such people are said to be perpetrating the evils because they are not professionals.

Commissioner for Insurance, Fola Daniel said the commission is intensifying efforts in its verification exercise on brokers as part of the industry cleaning exercise.

Daniel said the commission would now insist on filing of returns by the brokers as a prerequisite for renewal of license.

“We require brokers to file in their returns before their license is renewed so that we can know those who do only one or two business a year for a particular organisation because their brother is there”.