Irdai allows renewal, migration and portability of Covid-specific products

Renewal subject to insurer's underwriting policy, must be done before expiry of existing policy contract

With no enf in sight to the rise in number of covid cases, the insurance regulator has modified its earlier guidelines for corona-specific products and allowed renewal, migration as well as portability of such products.

Initially, the regulator had said, lifelong renewability, migration and portability are not applicable to such products.

However, it has now tweaked the guidelines and has allowed ‘Corona Kavach’ and ‘Corona Rakshak’ policies of any tenure to be renewed for further terms of three-and-a-half months, six-and-a-half months or nine-and-a-half months as per the option exercised by the policyholder. However, the renewal shall be subject to the underwriting policy of the insurer.

Also, the renewal has to be done before the expiry of the existing policy contract. Hence, these policies have been allowed by the regulator to be renewed till 31st March,2021.

Furthermore, on renewal, there will be no additional waiting period of 15 days and the policy coverage will continue seamlessly. And during renewal, sum insured can also be changed by the policyholders. But if there is an increase in the sum insured, the waiting period shall start afresh only for the enhanced portion of the sum insured, the regulator said.

As far as migration is concerned, for Corona Kavach policies, insurers have the choice to offer migration to any other indemnity based health insurance product offered by them as per the option exercised by the policyholder.

Further, in case of group policies, insurers can provide migration to the members insured to any other individual indemnity based health policy at the point of exit of the member insured from the group policy or the cessation of coverage of the underlying group policy.

The regulator has said, in case migration is allowed, the accrued gains of waiting period served in the existing Corona Kavach policy, be it in individual or group policies, should be protected. It has also asked the insurers to allow portability of Corona Kavach (individual) policy from one insurer to another.

“The accrued gains of waiting period served in the existing Corona Kavach policy shall be protected in respect of coverage of Covid-19, by the porting-in insurer”, the regulator said.

The Corona Kavach policy is an indemnity cover, with an optional cover that will be made available on a benefit basis. This indemnity cover takes care of hospitalisation expenses incurred by the insured for the treatment of Covid-19 on positive diagnosis. All costs relating to room, nursing expenses, medical consultation, including telemedicine, personal protective equipment kit, and intensive care unit, are covered under the policy. It also includes the cost of treatment for other co-morbidities, including pre-existing comorbid conditions along with the treatment for Covid-19.