The Hindu Business Line : National Insurance health cover for Bank of India customers

The policy will be available to all between the age group of three months to 65 years and renewals beyond 65 will be allowed at a premium fixed by NICL.

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Kolkata Feb. 23 National Insurance Company Ltd (NICL), along with its Bancassurance scheme partner Bank of India launched a "BoI National Swasthya Bima" policy on Friday for all customers of the bank. The insurance cover provides `cashless hospitalisation' in over 3,000 networked hospitals (through third-party administrators) all over India and does not require pre-acceptance medical examination.

Speaking at the launch ceremony, Mr M. Balachandran, CMD of BoI, said the co-branded health insurance product made available to BoI customers as an optional facility, would provide hassle-free family health insurance with a relatively lesser premium, covering the account holder, his/her spouse and two children up to 21 years.

The policy will be available to all between the age group of three months to 65 years and renewals beyond 65 will be allowed at a premium fixed by NICL.

Mr Balachandran said the bank intended to offer the product to all existing and new individual deposit customers in association with NICL, as a micro insurance scheme. The bank has some 24 million customers across 2,800 branches.

NICL has a strategic tie-up with BoI to distribute their non-life insurance products through its branches across the country since 1993.

According to Mr V. Ramasaamy, CMD of NICL, in the tailor-made policy, the sum assured will range between Rs 50,000 and Rs 5 lakh, and will be eligible for relief under Section 80D of the Income Tax Act, for the premium paid.

The policy will be available to all between the age group of three months to 65 years and renewals beyond 65 will be allowed at a premium fixed by NICL.

Centenary celebrations

The CMD said the BoI tie-up last year fetched a premium amount of Rs 35 crore and the target for 2006-07 was Rs 60 crore. He put the targeted total premium income of NICL in 2006-07 at Rs 3,800 crore.

He said the cover also included health check-up after three continuous claim-free years at 1 per cent of sum assured.

The policy will cover pre-existing diseases from the fourth year onwards.

NICL, which celebrated its centenary in 2006, is a pioneer in bancassurance, having tie-ups with many PSU banks and has corporate strategic alliances with Maruti, Hero Honda, Tata Motors, Eicher Motors, Eicher Tractors, Royal Enfield, Bajaj Temp, Suzuki Motors, Magma Leasing, ITC e-Choupal and WBFC.

Mr Ramasaamy said such bank tie-ups yielded a sum of Rs 170 crore for NICL in 2005-06 and in 2006-07 this is expected to touch Rs 250 crore.

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