SBI Life Insurance saw a slowdown in their group business in May. The company only registered a growth of 1.35 percent in new business premium, owing to the lockdown.

To understand the COVID claim picture after the brutal second wave, CNBC-TV18 spoke to Mahesh Kumar Sharma, MD & CEO of SBI Life Insurance.

Sharma said, “Last year, we had much more COVID claims in the second half than the first half. What we are doing is that we have changed our mortality assumptions and we have also set aside a higher amount. Last time we had set aside some amount, this time we have set aside a higher amount for any spike in COVID claims. So that is one of the things that we have done. We have set aside Rs 183 crore as compared to last year’s Rs 40 crore, which was increased to Rs 70 crore. This year we have taken Rs 183 crore as a conservative figure.”

He added, “Our expectation is that we will be back to normal if this is the way things proceed on the vaccination front.”

On claims, he said, “If you look at the trend from last year, I would agree with my peers out there that depending on the product, there could be some spikes here and there.”

On new business premium growth, Sharma said, “We have an internal plan and we go according to our internal estimates and we end the year very strong. I am very confident that we will be able to achieve our targets.”

On VNB, he said, “Value of new business, if you see the trend over the last year 3-4 years the growth has been very steady and we have been able to grow new businesses steadily year-after-year. I am very confident about our ability to keep growing.”

For full management commentary, watch the video.

(Edited by : Dipika)

First Published:Jun 30, 2021 11:35 AM IST