Help with my Life Insurance Company Startup

[dgoldenz]

So your company creates its own currency and then keeps 30% of it valued at approx $2M based on today's Ethereum price....which leaves $6M to cover everything else. Hmmmm....

 

[scagnt83]

So again, what problem does it solve? What are we eliminating and what are we gaining by eliminating it?

As it stands, I don't see how it would pass compliance with regulators, but it may not be explained well, or it just may need some tweaking.

Also, I am at a loss for what problem it is really solving.

Im not saying this specific company is of value or not. But the value of Ethereum is in having a blockchain contract that automatically validates and executes a specific set of predetermined actions. The tech behind the currency is the real value... but the tech also requires the currency to operate and compute the transactions... which is why people place transactional value in it.

Axa is using the tech to administer/process an existing policy that was already state approved.

Whats eliminated is the majority of insurance contract admin. It would still need an agent though

 

[NewbieNewbie]

Im not saying this specific company is of value or not. But the value of Ethereum is in having a blockchain contract that automatically validates and executes a specific set of predetermined actions. The tech behind the currency is the real value... but the tech also requires the currency to operate and compute the transactions... which is why people place transactional value in it.

Axa is using the tech to administer/process an existing policy that was already state approved.

Whats eliminated is the majority of insurance contract admin. It would still need an agent though

It would also need an underwriter too. I see no mention of either. Interesting idea but I would love to see these items addressed.

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This was just a press release for his business. There have been several replies with no response. Good luck. You will need it.

,.

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Sorry not responding to scagent but rather the op. Sorry

 

[larfme]

How much does a contract cost? What guarantees do a person have you guys would pay? Have you guys ran this buy the DOI for various states?

The payments come directly from the contracts and are released by validators, in the US this would be existing licensed insurance companies. Once a validator and the beneficiary signals to the contract code that the death occurred, the contract automatically pays out.
Likewise, assistance or agents would automatically be paid once the parameters of the contract are met, such as premium payments reaching a target amount.

All of the contract code is/will be publicly available.
The BitLlifeAndTrust project will not have control over payments or payouts.

 

[larfme]

What problem does this solve? The only thing I see is using a digital currency, which I suspect would be a real problem if there is any cash value in the policy.

There are several issues we are addressing, covered in our whitepaper. Primary to these is creating competition to payout the valid claims. Insurance carriers currently view claims as a loss and work to prevent those losses, our platform turns the payout into a revenue stream for validators.

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There is zero chance any State Insurance regulator in the USA will allow this. . You want to sell insurance but you don't want to form an insurance company. I would launch this in a 3rd world country

There are challenges to launching in the USA and our product will first launch in other markets.
We do believe the USA will be a viable market. Regulators primary objective is to protect the insured. Our model seeks to do the same while reducing the burden on regulators and increasing their ability to audit.
The blockchain technology will disrupt many industries not dissimilar to the way the internet has.

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I had that thought as well, I am hoping the OP sheds more light on this idea. Also, why the need for validators? Is there a problem with death certificates and the Social Security MDF?

Validators are certifying that the death certificate and/or social security MDF are authentic. If and where automated sources of this data are available, we plan to utilize them. There is currently still a need to cross reference the identity.

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What's up with the odd use of asterisks? Are you pointing to a footnote I don't see, or what?

I am not sure, I didn't see them when I posted and they are not in my original document. That is odd!

 

[VolAgent]

There are several issues we are addressing, covered in our whitepaper. Primary to these is creating competition to payout the valid claims. Insurance carriers currently view claims as a loss and work to prevent those losses, our platform turns the payout into a revenue stream for validators.

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There are challenges to launching in the USA and our product will first launch in other markets.
We do believe the USA will be a viable market. Regulators primary objective is to protect the insured. Our model seeks to do the same while reducing the burden on regulators and increasing their ability to audit.
The blockchain technology will disrupt many industries not dissimilar to the way the internet has.

The money is still coming from somewhere and the payor is still going to treat it as a loss.

Again, I don't see the role of a validator. A death certificate is pretty definitive that a person died, and is required for more than just insurance. Also, the real delay in paying claims are investigations in the first two years for material misrepresentation, and sometimes suicide. A validator isn't going to be able to change that, as the delay is typically caused by medical providers not returning their files in a timely manner. Most insurance companies outsource this, and from what I have seen the companies that do it are relentless.

Maybe there is an administrative burden that you can solve, but for US companies these two are meaningless. They are receiving pennies and paying out dollars, of course they want to limit losses. Also, unless you can speed up the return of medical records, validators are only going to slow it down, not speed it up.

Also, you seem to think companies don't want to pay claims. I completely disagree with that. Again, I have seen companies become relentless in chasing down people who start the claim process but don't follow through. They want it resolved. Being known for not paying claims is not good for business. The biggest reason claims are not paid is material misrepresentation from the insured, with or without the help of an agent.

I would say your biggest value to companies is if you can reduce administrative costs. One final thought on validators. If they are getting medical records, then HIPAA comes into play. I'm not sure companies want to outsource that to individuals. Too much liability can roll up to the company if they are careless with protected health information.

 

[walthamny]

I agree with Volagent 100%

By the way, increasing auditors ability to audit will get you nowhere in the United States. None of the 50 divisions of insurance ever think that way. Some divisions of insurance still use 5.25 floppy disk.

May be if Guam or Puerto Rico go independent and start a new divisions of insurance.

 

[VolAgent]

Also you mentioned validators validating the MDF and death certificates.

What???

The MDF comes straight from Social Security, so unless they have been hacked, nothing to validate. And if they have, your validators aren't going to be able to validate it anyway.

Same with death certificate, a death certificate with raised seal is the end all, be all. I have never seen it questioned. I assume if it looked out of order, wasn't correct for the state, then maybe. But again, that is the exception not the routine. Internal staff has been doing that for years and will continue to do so.

Again, maybe you can reduce administrative costs, and if so that would be of value. However, after policy issue most admin work requires a real person with access to company records. Banking changes, beneficiary changes, policy inquiries that aren't available online, etc. Most companies will only expose so much information to an agent, even if the agent is the one that gave it to them to begin with. I don't see how outsourcing that is going to change that. You are exposing information to a third party over whom you have even less control.

You could take this as me being against it. And in a way I am, simply because I'm not seeing your value. I'm not seeing a problem you are solving. Now, SCAgent83 says Ethereum contracts will be able to reduce administrative costs, and I'm willing to accept that. I'm just not seeing how yet.

 

[larfme]

Also you mentioned validators validating the MDF and death certificates.

What???

The MDF comes straight from Social Security, so unless they have been hacked, nothing to validate. And if they have, your validators aren't going to be able to validate it anyway.

Same with death certificate, a death certificate with raised seal is the end all, be all. I have never seen it questioned. I assume if it looked out of order, wasn't correct for the state, then maybe. But again, that is the exception not the routine. Internal staff has been doing that for years and will continue to do so.

Again, maybe you can reduce administrative costs, and if so that would be of value. However, after policy issue most admin work requires a real person with access to company records. Banking changes, beneficiary changes, policy inquiries that aren't available online, etc. Most companies will only expose so much information to an agent, even if the agent is the one that gave it to them to begin with. I don't see how outsourcing that is going to change that. You are exposing information to a third party over whom you have even less control.

You could take this as me being against it. And in a way I am, simply because I'm not seeing your value. I'm not seeing a problem you are solving. Now, SCAgent83 says Ethereum contracts will be able to reduce administrative costs, and I'm willing to accept that. I'm just not seeing how yet.

VolAgent,
Thank you for your feedback and questions. They are good questions.
I agree there is not a dispute, as you outlined above, related to death certificates and MDF. Someone needs to relay that information to the online contract which is the role of the validators.
The other role of the validator is to verify that the statements made by the insured are valid, this is done once a claim is filed and not before.


All information, such as beneficiaries is collected online and encrypted inside the digital contract, where required. There is no back office. The insured maintains this information directly online themselves or with the help of an assistant / agent.

We do not intent to have medical evaluations at this time and plan to release policy contracts similar to those already on the market that also do not require medical evaluations. There are medical question that the insured will need to answer.

 

[VolAgent]

VolAgent,
Thank you for your feedback and questions. They are good questions.
I agree there is not a dispute, as you outlined above, related to death certificates and MDF. Someone needs to relay that information to the online contract which is the role of the validators.
The other role of the validator is to verify that the statements made by the insured are valid, this is done once a claim is filed and not before.


All information, such as beneficiaries is collected online and encrypted inside the digital contract, where required. There is no back office. The insured maintains this information directly online themselves or with the help of an assistant / agent.

We do not intent to have medical evaluations at this time and plan to release policy contracts similar to those already on the market that also do not require medical evaluations. There are medical question that the insured will need to answer.

Your insurance knowledge is lacking, or at least your ability to convey it is. From what you are writing, I don't believe you have the first clue how an insurance company handles a claim and determines whether it was valid or not.

Also, there is a lot of human interaction in determining whether or not to deny a claim, and it has everything to do with legal liability.

In fact, I just read the newsletter from a company, perhaps one that other members here get. Their compliance officer talks about paying an invalid claim because the agent incorrectly interpreted the questions and advised the insured to answer no when the answer was yes. Instead of denying it and leaving it to the beneficiary or regulator to sue and eat the agent for lunch, they went ahead and paid it and coached the agent on better field underwriting.

Completely a mistake on the agent's part. However the company did the right thing by both the agent and the beneficiary and paid. Otherwise it would have been up to the beneficiary to sue and then the agent's E&O would have settled. The company protected their reputation and kept the agent out of a legal mess that would have damaged their reputation and ability to make a living.

Also, I don't believe these digital wallets are going to be as easy as everyone thinks. When my wallet is stolen or money is stolen from it, there has to be a mechanism to handle it. If doing so breaks the contract, then the contract never would have been allowed by a regulator to begin with.