March 2020 Carrier Updates

March 2020 Carrier Updates

Last Updated: March 31

AIG

  • Tips for faster informals. AIG's updated Informal Apps guide has tips for more efficient processing.
  • Foreign Nationals Guidelines update. Employment Authorization Document (EAD) requirements revised.
  • No two IULs are equal. There are some considerations to know before selling or buying an Index Universal Life insurance (IUL) product. Some IUL products include Bonus Multipliers that enhance the illustrated interest rates for a more favorable, though unlikely, illustrated result. At face value they look great! These illustrations look mathematically correct, but they tend to portray the most positive possible outcomes - something most clients might not experience. Stress testing these illustrations is a vital component of understanding the potential risks. Take a look at the scripted presentation, white paper and NEW training video we’ve created to help improve understanding of illustrations, IULs, bonus multipliers, and how it all really works.

Need help with any of AIG's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Cincinnati Life

  • Examiner precautions: COVID-19. In light of COVID-19 (coronavirus), some exam companies are taking extra precautions to ensure the health of their examiners. Prior to scheduling exams, clients may be asked about signs of fever or respiratory distress, if they have been around anyone with these symptoms, or about travel within the last 14 days. If answering "yes" to these questions, the exam will be scheduled for 14 days later.

Need help with any of Cincinnati Life's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Equitable

  • How VUL Optimizer stacks up against the competition. Life Insurance Retirement Plans (LIRPs) are a great complement to traditional retirement plans offering tax-deferred growth, potentially tax-free distributions and no limits on annual contributions. Take a look at how our VUL OptimizerSM, one of the most competitive VUL products in the market, stacks up against the competition.
  • Rate changes for certain IUL and VUL products. Historically low U.S. Treasury rates and the prolonged low interest rate environment continue to drive volatility in the markets. As a result, IUL growth cap rates and fixed account crediting rates for certain IUL and VUL products are being reduced.

Need help with any of Equitable's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Lincoln

  • Pricing Update: Lincoln MoneyGuard® III. Following a thorough and in-depth analysis of all factors influencing pricing, including those related to the persistent low interest rates, we will be making pricing adjustments. Effective March 16, 2020, Lincoln Financial Group will implement pricing updates to the Lincoln MoneyGuard® III product with the launch of Lincoln MoneyGuard® III (2020). This is a change to rates only. There are no changes to the product structure, contract language, forms, compensation or types of benefits provided.
  • Pricing Update: Lincoln MoneyGuard® II. Following a thorough and in-depth analysis of all factors influencing pricing, including those related to the persistent low interest rates, we will be making pricing adjustments. Effective March 16, 2020, Lincoln Financial Group will implement pricing updates to the Lincoln MoneyGuard® II (2020) product with the launch of Lincoln MoneyGuard® II (2020) – 03/16/20. This is a change to rates only. There are no changes to the product structure, contract language, forms, compensation or types of benefits provided. Additionally, this product is only available in the state of California.
  • Lincoln Care Coverage® Accelerated Benefits Rider – Now Available in Additional States. Effective March 16, 2020, Lincoln Care Coverage® Accelerated Benefits Rider (CCABR), a life insurance rider, will be made available on Lincoln AssetEdge® VUL (2019), Lincoln AssetEdge® Exec VUL (2019), Lincoln WealthAccumulate® IUL (2019) and Lincoln WealthPreserve® IUL (2019) in the following states: Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Indiana, New Jersey, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Available at policy issue when attached to a life insurance policy, this rider is designed for clients who have a primary need for death benefit protection but are also concerned about long-term care expenses of covered services for temporary and permanent chronic illness.
  • COVID-19 (Coronavirus) Underwriting Update. Effective immediately and until further notice, any applicant who meets age and rate class criteria posted in the PDF above AND confirms foreign travel to any Level 3 country listed on the CDC website [cdc.gov/coronavirus], the underwriting offer will be postponed until the applicant is back in the United States for a minimum of 30 days.

Need help with any of Lincoln's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Mutual of Omaha

  • Term Life Answers Pricing Changes. Effective April 1, 2020, we will be updating our Term Life Answers (TLA) product pricing for new issue policies. Effective April 1, 2020, we are also reducing our quarterly modal factor from .275 to .265.
  • Upcoming Rate Changes for Life Products. We are announcing upcoming changes to our participation rates, cap rates and fixed account rates on our life products. These rate decreases come as a result of the current rate environment and the increased market volatility, which causes an increase in options costs. Effective April 1, 2020, we will be lowering the fixed crediting rate on Income Advantage IUL, Life Protection Advantage IUL, IUL Express and AccumUL Answers. Effective May 10, 2020, we will be making changes to our participation rates and cap rates on our Income Advantage IUL and Life Protection Advantage IUL products.
  • Massachusetts: Rate Adjustments Effective June 1, 2020. Effective June 1, 2020, Mutual of Omaha will be implementing long-term care rate adjustments for Massachusetts.

Need help with any of Mutual of Omaha's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Nationwide

Need help with any of Nationwide's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

North American

  • Updated information for minors in Maryland. With the implementation of the updated Maryland application, we are pleased to announce that we will now accept applications on minors in Maryland if the new paper application is utilized. Juvenile sales are still unavailable for applications taken via SimpleSubmit®, but the necessary updates are also coming to the Maryland e-Application in the near future.
  • New Temporary Life Insurance Agreement for Kansas. In a continuing effort to improve you and your client’s experience, we have updated our Temporary Life Insurance Agreement (TIA) form and the guidelines for when TIA is available. Form number ICC19L2977DKS Rev. 4-19 replaces form number L2977CKS Rev. 5-17 and is available immediately on Forms Factory®. The previous version of the form will no longer be accepted if the signed date is April 27, 2020, or later.
  • New Temporary Life Insurance Agreement. In a continuing effort to improve you and your client’s experience, we have updated our Temporary Life Insurance Agreement (TIA) form and the guidelines for when TIA is available. Form number ICC19L2977D Rev. 4-19 (with state variations) replaces form number ICC19L2977C Rev. 5-16 and is available immediately on Forms Factory®. The previous version of the form will no longer be accepted if the signed date is April 27, 2020, or later.
  • Juvenile applications now available on SimpleSubmit® in Florida. North American is excited to announce an upcoming enhancement to SimpleSubmit. Effective April 1, 2020, juvenile applications will be accepted through SimpleSubmit. Now agents can use the same efficient platform to provide needed coverage for their clients’ children.
  • Introducing WriteAway® for paper applications. North American is excited to announce an enhancement that allows you to utilize our WriteAway accelerated underwriting program with your New Business paper applications.
  • New general purpose application. In a continuing effort to improve you and your client's experience, North American has created and/or updated the following forms: General Purpose Application, Statement of Health, and Application Overflow Page.
  • New and updated questionnaires. North American has created and/or updated the following questionnaires: Criminal History Questionnaire, Marijuana Questionnaire, and Foreign Travel and Residence Questionnaire.
  • New Policy Change applications for underwritten changes. In a continuing effort to improve you and your client’s experience, North American has updated and/or created the following forms: Application for Internal Exchange, Application for Reinstatement or Change to Existing Policy (with underwriting), Statement of Health, and Application Overflow Page.

Need help with any of North American's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Pacific Life

  • Face Amount Limit Change for PL Promise GUL Starting April 1, 2020. In response to decreasing market interest rates as well as rapidly changing market conditions related to the national emergence of the COVID-19 (Coronavirus), Pacific Life will limit new PL Promise GUL1 business to face amounts of $2.5 million or less effective Wednesday, April 1, 2020. PL Promise GUL is a universal life insurance product with no-lapse guarantees.
  • Service and trial update for PL Promise products. PacLife is temporarily updating requirements for incoming trial applications for PL Promise Term and PL Promise GUL.

Need help with any of Pacific Life's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Protective

  • An Update on Electronic Policy Delivery Enhancements Available Now. In January, we announced that we will be making some improvements to the Electronic Policy Delivery (EPD) platform. Find out what features are now available and how they can benefit you — and see what improvements will be coming soon!
    • EPD status on Policy Details page – Now available!
    • Extension of EPD timeframe for clients – Now available!
    • Billing mode changes within the EPD platform – Coming soon!
    • Ability for BGAs and agents to resend reminder email – Coming soon!
  • New Premium Limits for Certain Life Insurance Products. Due to the current interest rate environment, and particularly the decrease in yields over the past few weeks we find it necessary to implement new premium limits for certain products. Effective March 30, 2020, in all states including New York, the following annual premium limits will be implemented:
    • Protective Advantage Choice UL: $500,000
    • Protective Indexed Choice UL: $1,000,000
    • Protective Custom Choice UL: $1,000,000
    • ProClassic II UL: $1,000,000
  • New Premium Limits for Certain Life Insurance Products. Protective Life is committed to serving our customers and providing valuable products. Due to the current interest rate environment, and particularly the decrease in yields over the past few weeks, we find it necessary to implement new premium limits for certain products. Effective March 30, 2020, in all states including New York, the following annual premium limits will be implemented: Protective Advantage Choice UL: $500,000; Protective Indexed Choice UL: $1,000,000; Protective Custom Choice UL: $1,000,000; ProClassic II UL: $1,000,000. For Protective® Strategic Objectives II VUL, the annual premium limit will remain at $5,000,000. The ELI illustration system and other quoting services will reflect these changes on March 30, 2020.

Need help with any of Protective's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Prudential

  • Changes to Prudential product offerings. Prudential Individual Life Insurance continues to help customers with their life insurance needs in this challenging time of interest rate changes and market volatility. To do that, we take a prudent financial approach by continuously reevaluating our product portfolio and have made some adjustments to our offerings. More specifically:
    • Reducing caps and credited rates for IUL products
    • Restricting single pays on Universal Life products
    • Suspending sales of 30-year Term products until June (goal: reintroduce/reprice in June).
    • Revising the large case review thresholds for UL Protector, SUL protector and SIUL.
    • Increasing pricing on UL protector

Need help with any of Prudential's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Securian

  • Cap Decreases effective 3/21/2020. In light of the sudden and unprecedented economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and wanting to make sure we are serving in the long-term best interest of our policyholders, we will be reducing our cap rates and participation rates on the company’s Indexed Universal Life product portfolio. A communication will be sent to all of our valued LIBRA partners in the next day which will include specifics on rate changes. The most prominent indexed account is the S&P 500, 100% Participation on the Eclipse Accumulator IUL. The cap rate for this account will be reduced by 75 basis points from 10.50% to 9.75%. The other significant account is the uncapped S&P Low Volatility Index. The participation rate on this will decrease from 90% to 75%. The changes will take effect for all premium received and new index segments created after March 20th. All premium received on or before Friday, March 20th will have current rates applied.

Need help with any of Securian's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Symetra

  • Symetra Term now offers even more competitive pricing. We are excited to introduce our repriced Symetra Term Life Insurance! It offers customized coverage, advance access and even lower guaranteed level premiums than before — now at face amounts of $1.5 million and above!
  • Maximum illustrated rates for Accumulator and Protector IUL. Effective March 13, 2020, we will be updating the maximum illustrated rates, as prescribed by AG49, for our Accumulator and Protector IUL products.
    Maximum illustrated rates for Accumulator IUL will be:
    • Base Index Strategies: 5.67%
    • Core Index Strategies: 6.62%
    • Select Index Strategies: 7.44%
    Maximum illustrated rates for Protector IUL will be:
    • Base Index Strategies: 4.00%
    • Core Index Strategies: 5.14%
    • Select Index Strategies: 6.16%
    Please note, there are no changes to index caps or participation rates. The new maximum illustrated rates will be available on Winflex and Symetra Life Illustrator on March 13, 2020.

Need help with any of Symetra's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

Transamerica

  • Whole Life Conversions. Some of your clients may have policies with level term periods that expire this year so now could be the time to convert to whole life. Maybe your clients' lives have changed over the last year. They could be reassured knowing their loved ones are going to be taken care of with a permanent life insurance policy. Keep them covered with Transamerica LifetimeSM. This solution provides flexibility to choose coverage that meets their new needs. And your clients can keep many of the product options they enjoyed with term insurance and won't have to undergo medical examinations for their new policies.

Need help with any of Transamerica's products?
Call us at 1-800-823-4852 or click here to email our Brokerage Sales Support team.

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