An insurance executive, Mr Armstrong Harrison, has blamed the backwardness and low penetration level of the sector in the Nigerian economy on influx of quacks into the industry.
He said that the low patronage of the insurance industry by the Nigerian public could be attributed to the ignorance of the insuring public in differentiating between insurance brokers and quacks.
Harrison, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Corporate Insurance Development Limited, disclosed this while interacting with newsmen in Port Harcourt, recently.
He noted that the nefarious activities of quacks had continued to destroy the industry’s advancement.
“The perception of an average Nigerian about the insurance industry is that it is filled with fraudsters or brokers that do not pay claims.
“If you probe further, to ascertain if the person had been a victim of such delayed claim settlement, you will find that he or she doesn’t even hold any insurance policy at all.
“All that they say is hearsay from what they have heard from one place or the other”, he said.
Harrison affirmed that an insurance company that knows its onions would not want to treat its customers badly by delaying claims settlement, saying every insurer will not want to lose a customer to a competitor.
He noted that oftentimes, many quacks parade themselves as brokers to deceive unsuspecting public.
Harrison explained that the major reason people assume that all insurance companies delay claim settlements intentionally is that people want insurance companies to automatically compensate them when they have a loss without considering the type of policy they subscribe to or without proper investigation of what caused the loss on the part of the insured.
He, however, said that Section 70 of the Insurance Act, 2003, required that claims must be settled within 90 days, after the insurance company had accepted liability and issued its discharge voucher.

By: Corlins Walter