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Following the fair trade watchdog Competition Commission ordering a probe into the state-owned general insurers' health cover policies, the companies have allayed fears that the common third-party administrators (TPA) being formed by them will create any problem to the existing 70-odd TPAs.
On Friday, the Competition Commission had ordered a probe against all the public sector general insurers, including the largest player New India Assurance, for alleged unfair business practices with regard to their third-party administrators after the TPA industry body made a complaint to them.
All the four state-owned general insurers--New India Assurance, Oriental Insurance, National Insurance and United India Insurance--are currently busy forming a common TPA among them. These four state-run general insurers control nearly 70% health insurance market which was worth Rs 15,000 crore as of March 2014. The mediclaim sector is annually growing at 15%.
"Yes, we have formed a common TPA of our own and we have already registered a company as Health Insurance TPA of India. It is likely to become fully operational by June 15, 2015 as we are currently under the process of creating an IT infrastructure for the same," an official of New India Assurance told PTI.
The proposed company has already floated request for quotes for creation of its IT platform and the bids for the same are likely to open next week. Also, the company has appointed a general manager rank official from GIC Re, P K Bhagat as the managing director.
"We have received some communication from the Competition Commission at the General Insurers (public sector) Association of India level, for which we have already sent our reply too," the official added.
The private sector TPA have complained that in case the common TPA comprising all the four general insurers comes into being, this might create a monopolistic situation in the market.
