AIA Singapore and Medix in May 2018 announced an exclusive partnership to offer Personal Medical Case Management Services (PMCM) to AIA customers. The service is said to be the first of its kind in Singapore and will help customers facing serious medical conditions by making sure they get the right diagnosis as fast as possible, have access to optimal treatment, and are supported through their treatment journey until recovery.

U.S. surgeon general Jerome Adams in April 2018 urged employers to help in fighting the opioid epidemic. He was speaking at a conference sponsored by the National Business Group on Health (NBGH), an association of large employers. Adams estimates that 2.1 million people in the U.S. are struggling with an opioid-use condition. While these drugs can be helpful for a short time, they pose serious addiction risks. Common opioids include

As global business travel continues to increase at a rapid pace, International SOS and Control Risks in April 2018 published insight into the importance of travel security support to the business traveler. In the past two years alone, demand for security advice has grown by almost 30%, and has had an 800% increase since 2008¹. On average, over 100 business travelers and international assignees a day have been supported

Denizen Financial in March 2018 unveiled its global, border-less account for expat banking which allows customers to receive money in one country and pay it out in another immediately. This avoids international transfer fees and eliminates currency exchange fees. Designed for mobile populations, the Denizen global banking platform makes managing finances across borders fast, easy and more affordable. Expats, immigrants, and frequent world travelers are often forced to maintain multiple

LifeScore Labs, a wholly owned subsidiary of U.S. insurance carrier Mass Mutual, and global reinsurer Swiss Re, have announced a collaboration to support LifeScore360, LifeScore Labs’ standards-based algorithmic risk scoring solution. LifeScore360 will be offered as an additional analytics option for Swiss Re’s automated underwriting system (Magnum). In addition, Swiss Re will more generally support the use of LifeScore360 in life reinsurance transactions in the U.S. LifeScore Labs was

Men and women of all age groups have been visiting YouCanPlanForThis.org, a free website launched in September 2017 by independent nonprofit FAIR Health that enables New York State residents to plan their healthcare costs. The site offers cost lookup tools, powered by FAIR Health’s billions of private healthcare claims records, that allow consumers to estimate in-network and out of-network costs for thousands of medical procedures in their geographic areas,

Generali Global Assistance (GGA) in February 2018 announced that it has implemented its proprietary identity and digital protection platform for Deposits.com, which is now able to offer its customers 360° identity protection services including prevention, monitoring, alerts and resolution tools. Deposits.com is a multi-platform financial directory and secure, online portal that connects financial institutions with consumers looking to open financial accounts, take out a mortgage or loan, find a

European Union (E.U.) Directive 2016/97, which regulates the distribution of insurance products and is intended to strengthen consumer protection, in February 2018 was postponed by a few months. The deadline for implementation, initially set to February 23, 2018, is now pushed back to October 2018. The deadline for transposition into national laws by E.U. Member States is extended to July 1, while the deadline for application is now October

Allianz in January 2018 invested $59.2 million in Boston, Massachussets-headquartered U.S. telehealth platform American Well. Allianz carried out the investment through its digital investment unit, Allianz X, supported by the Health Innovation Center of Allianz Partners. Furthermore, Allianz will join American Well’s Board of Directors. American Well’s telehealth platform, called The Exchange, handles clinical, administration, and security requirements according to U.S. healthcare regulations and best practices. In addition to

Aviva, the UK’s largest general insurer and a leading life and pensions provider, in January 2018 announced its intention to withdraw from the international private medical insurance (iPMI) market, following a strategic review which found that iPMI “is not central” to the company’s focus on growing its health business in the UK. As of 1 May 2018, existing iPMI customers will be able to continue coverage by accepting a

Sleep technology firm Shleep in December 2017 announced plans to showcase its neuroscience-driven sleep application at CES 2018. Available on iOS and Android mobile devices, Shleep is a fun, easy to use, science-based sleep coaching app that helps people change their behavior to improve sleep. Poor sleep has many negative effects More than a third of American adults are not getting enough sleep on a regular basis and, as

Aetna International has announced the launch of Access US, a product aimed at helping any non-US headquartered company that currently has, or is hiring, American citizens based in the USA. The Access US Plans are an ideal fit for companies with geographically dispersed employees located in the US. They are an ACA-compliant (Obamacare-compliant) medical product designed for organizations with 50 or more total employees worldwide and allow US companies

EY in November 2017 announced a partnership with Concur to develop services that help global business travelers manage tax and immigration compliance risks via Concur’s App Center. The integrated offering will capture relevant travel and business activity data within Concur. Using EY tax and immigration technology, the integration will analyze Concur data to make real-time assessments of a business traveler’s tax and immigration obligations before they travel. Corporate users

KPMG and global provider of Human Capital Management (HCM) solutions ADP in November 2017 joined forces to help multinational companies better manage employees who need to relocate from one country to another. By combining KPMG’s Global Mobility Services (GMS) practice, including its proprietary LINK Enterprise technology platform, with the ADP Global Payroll solution, the two companies can provide multinational companies with an integrated approach to managing payrolls and reporting

AIA in October 2017 concluded a new bancassurance partnership with Bangkok Bank in Thailand. Bangkok Bank will distribute AIA Thailand’s retail and group protection and long-term savings products on an exclusive basis. The 15-year agreement will become effective in the first half of 2018. Bangkok Bank is the largest bank in Thailand by total assets; it has more than 16 million customer accounts and around 1,200 branches nationwide. Typical

Sleep expert Dr. Els van der Helm in October 2017 launched her new website, shleepbetter: www.shleepbetter.com Shleep serves global clients (both businesses and leaders) and helps them improve their performance through better sleep management. Shleep’s mission is to help organizations and people sleep better. To reach this goal, they offer workshops, assessments, coaching, and a unique and scalable sleep coaching app to help you, your workforce and/or coworkers sleep better –

Swiss Life in October 2017 entered into a long-term partnership with Swiss business software provider for small businesses, bexio. Swiss Life becomes one of the largest shareholders of bexio and Swiss Life Switzerland CEO Markus Leibundgut joins the Board of Directors. The start-up already has over 10 000 customers and employs a staff of 50 in Switzerland. Bexio focuses on small-to-medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and offers web-based services – including

Zenefits in October 2017 announced a major change in its strategy. It now intends to become the technology backbone for the employee benefits industry by linking carriers, brokers, companies, and employees with its Zenefits Certified Broker Partner Program and Zenefits Ben Connect. This will allow Zenefits to cooperate with brokers rather than compete against them. The Zenefits Broker Partner Program was launched with the announcement of a partnership with

Sun Life Financial and Pareto Captive Services in October 2017 announced a new stop-loss group captive solution, Legend Re, which will be available in the U.S. for policies effective January 1, 2018. The initiative is designed to reduce claims volatility for small and medium self-funded employers or fully-insured employers transitioning to self-funding in order to realize cost savings. Employers in a group captive typically have under 500 employees, are

MSH International, citing favorable U.S. state regulations allowing self insurance for groups with as few as ten plan members, along with the growth of the medical stop-loss business, in October 2017 announced a new stop-loss product for self-insured expatriate and third-country national (TCN) customers that includes medical benefits as well as life and disability options. President and CEO Philippe de Dreuzy said “Based on my 25 years’ experience I

Activehours, a mobile app that gives people access to their pay directly from their smartphones whenever they need it, has announced a $39 million investment round led by Andreessen Horowitz, along with participation from earlier-stage investors Matrix Partners, Ribbit Capital, and March Capital Partners. Launched in 2014, Activehours has added employees from more than 25,000 companies including Starbucks, Apple, Home Depot and Target, who use the app. Activehours charges

B3i, a group of fifteen global insurers and reinsurers, in September 2017 launched a fully functional beta version of its integrated blockchain solution for the re/insurance industry at the 61st Monte Carlo RVS Conference. In seeking to fulfill the potential of blockchain, B3i group members have attempted to build an efficient worldwide industry platform for market participants to more easily cede, handle, and trade risks. Speaking for B3i, Paul

HR software provider for mid-sized companies Namely has released the results of its open enrollment survey, which identifies what is most important to U.S. employees when it comes to benefits. Findings indicate that 36% of employees rate their HR departments with a “C” or lower when it comes to open enrollment. While 57% of respondents say that their employer has prepared them “pretty well,” only 27% give them an

The demand for short term international private health insurance or IPMI which bridges the gap between travel insurance and longer term cover looks set to keep growing, particularly as events such as Brexit unfold. Brexit could unleash yet more demand as international arrangements such as the European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) may no longer cover travelers to and from the U.K. . The impact of the internet, budgetary pressures

Data breaches and cyber security are a significant concern with U.S. businesses expecting to see an all-time high of nearly 1,500 reported data breaches in 2017. Business owners need to be more vigilant than ever in order to avoid these near-certain attacks, and to protect their employees’ and customers’ personally identifiable information (PII). Generali Global Assistance, in cooperation with the Identity Theft Resources Center (ITRC), in August 2017 released

Global Benefits Vision is proud to announce the release of the new Global Employee Benefits and Global Mobility Directory! Our vision is for the directory to be the core record of Employee Benefits and Global Mobility providers in the industry, and a one-stop shop for company data and contact details at your fingertips. We will be revising it periodically to ensure the data remain current and to add new

A July 2017 report by Research Nester indicates that the corporate travel insurance market expects to see robust growth from 2017 to 2024 at a rate of 8.6% per year (CAGR  – Compound Average Growth Rate) over the forecast period, thanks to an increase in business travel. The European region accounts for the largest market share in the global corporate travel insurance market, followed by Asia-Pacific, while Europe is