Cigna New Zealand has released some initial product changes to its OnePath product suite, the first of a series of planned enhancements it confirmed will roll out over the next 12-18 months.
Cigna stated its major changes include:
- Mortgage Repayment Cover now includes options to cover rental obligations or income. The offset provision has changed and a claim payment cap of $7,500 per month added before offsets apply.
- The inflation option has been introduced to the Assurance Extra Mortgage Repayment Cover product. As a special introductory offer, there will be no additional cost in the first year for this benefit on all new business sold in the next six months.
- The paper Application form has been simplified – making it shorter and easier to use. This is the start of a bigger project to overhaul the application forms and policy documents to make them easier to use and understand, which will be delivered later in the year.
- Client Benefits have been amended. Claiming to be unique to the market, Cigna said the benefits cover mental health counselling, wellness advice, budgeting advice, career counselling and legal advice, and are available to help ensure customers are well supported throughout their lives. Changes include extending the cover to include dependent children; adding additional wellness advice services such as dietician advice, physiotherapy or personal trainer sessions; and making the benefits, and process to access them easier.
Cigna New Zealand Head of Strategy, Product and Integration, Simon Tohill, says they have been working to better understand the needs of their customers and advisers since acquiring OnePath last year.
He said an upgrade of Cigna’s back office administration system is also on the way as they continue to integrate the OnePath business operations and separate from the ANZ.
“Whenever we make enhancements to our product suite we pass these back to our customers. We do this according to the Policy Enhancement Benefit included in policy documentation,” said Tohill.
“This means that if our customers ever need to make a claim they will be assessed using the policy wording that provides the most favourable outcome,” he said. “We look forward to releasing more enhancements in the coming months.”
All changes are effective from Monday 8 April and a full list of product changes is available for advisers to access on the OnePath Adviser Hub.