Mrs. Natar is the Superintendent of Insurance Companies and is responsible for supervising the Insurance Companies. Unfortunately we will reveal to you that this supervision is mildly deficient.
Of course we are the ones paying for this deficiency for a while now, after we have lost so many millions from our investments, our studies, our housing loans, our investment plans and we continue to lose money every day, mainly from car insurances who become more expensive every year and pay much less on their side.
Through 24H –unfortunately- we have predicted many negatives like:
The huge rise in unemployment, which continues to exist.
Where is this lack of liquidity taking us to?
The inability of banks to lower their rates.
Orphanides and Christofias’ catastrophic actions after the deposits cut.
How wrong was the decision of the House concerning the first deposits cut that was rejected and unfortunately led us to this current situation.
The sale of Cypriot banks to Greece as a present by Mr. Anastasiadis.
What is going to happen to EAC?
Our open letters to the President of the Republic have added other points as well.
We dared to reveal other scandals like the Airport and Hermes scandals, Shacola’s Lake, the Helicopters, the Airplanes, the conversation that is now taking place regarding the early renewal of the Airport’s contract between the Minister Tassos Mitsopoulos and Hermes.
Continuing the revelations regarding insurance’s issue:
We began collaboration with Liberty Life two weeks ago and the Company informed us for terminating its business on a late hour.
We regret to say that no one cared.
It seems that SEC and the Minister of Finance had to deal with more serious issues.
We wonder what Mrs Natar did about all this.
A life insurance company suddenly terminates its business and no one cares?
Get ready because there is more to come.
The people who are responsible for all of this should wake up and inform the policyholders.
We will begin with the General Industry and in particular the Division of Motor Vehicles and the reason is simple:
It is very dangerous division; companies grow quickly and very easily.
They are damaging us consecutively, since car accidents are thousands every year and they should stop taking advantage of us.
Since the last three years the insurance rates on cars grow sharply, we have tried to talk with the Companies and the Office of the Superintendent of Insurance and get informed.
Therefore you should note the following:
Firstly we chose the following General Insurance Companies due to this increase:
1. Atlantic Insurance.
2. Cosmos Insurance.
3. Prime Insurance.
4. Gan Direct
5. Hydra Insurance.
6. Olympic Insurance.
7. Trust Insurance.
Our selection of course is based on other key reasons such as who are the managers and what is their past? Who are the owners? How do they behave to their policyholders especially when they have an accident / claim etc?
We have contacted the above Companies seeking for basic information that should be available to us under Law.
Our questions were the following:
1. Who constitutes the Company’s management?
2. Who are situated in Customers Service, in Damage Control (claims), in the Sales Department?
3. Company’s accounts for 2012 should be located in the office of the Registrar of Companies based on the Law.
4. Who would be the right one to talk to us and answer to our many questions before we move into our own conclusions?
Ten days later and we are still waiting for their response. An initial exception is the Olympic Insurance Company who told us that they need the Board’s approval!
We attempt to communicate a number of times with the above insurance companies, this time by sending emails.
Some of them responded to us.
Altantic and Cosmos referred us to their websites, where they have all the information published and rightly so, since they are integrated in the Cyprus Stock Exchange. Also, Trust Insurance Company and the Prime Insurance responded to us.
This week we will deal with the Office of the Superintendent of Insurance, so we will be patient for one more week regarding the communication issue before we start writing for each Company again.
The questions and findings are too many.
Let’s move on to the totally unorganized supervision.
A whole service which controls almost one billion insurance rates each year has no separate website.
No news. No updates. No instructions and circulars.
The Annual Reports of the Insurance Market are not available in Greek (English only).
There is no information for Insurance Companies.
There are no annual accounts of the companies.
You try to call and no one answers.
You send an mail and you do not get a respond.
In case they answer, they cannot help you.
If you go over there, they are not helping you and they are hostile.
WELL SIRS, PLEASE EXPLAIN TO US HOW CAN POLICYHOLDERS MAKE A COMPLAINT? HOW WILL YOU HELP THEM SINCE YOU ARE INNACESSIBLE?
Read below our own experience with Superintendent’s Office.
Sometimes people may wonder why there are telephones in the public services of our state.
We attempted to contact by telephone the Insurance Companies Control Service of the Ministry of Finance.
On the footnote of this service we can see that the phone number is 22-602990.
We tried several times but the phone was constantly busy or not responding at all.
In the particular website a competent officer for registration of insurance intermediaries is mentioned. Therefore, we decided to call the responsible officer to figure out what was really going on.
The very kind gentleman could not serve us. He referred us to the assistant inspector who was able to give us the information we needed.
We called on the number 22-602675 but no one was answering. We tried more than 10 times … but nothing!
After several phone calls and since no one would answer the phone, we went to the Service ourselves and asked immediately for the gentleman we have talked on the phone, to tell us who the assistant inspector was.
Which it happened!
After explaining to the lady who I was, I began to ask her about the information we needed.
We asked for:
1. The annual accounts of Cyprus Insurance Companies.
2. If there are complaints to the department and to what incidents the complaints are usually referred to.
3. How the Department works and what is its main role.
4.How come we cannot find the information needed on the Service’s website.
Of course we did not get any answer. She could not answer to any of the above. With a very strict look she replied ‘no I cannot tell you anything.”
Since we did not get any answer, we asked her to give us details about the Annual Accounts of 2012. This should be already published on the service’s website.
After we showed her the annual documents of 2011 we asked her to give us the ones of 2012, which did not exist on the website. We even told her to check the website and find it out herself.
After checking the website to confirm something she had no idea about, she saw that the file was not uploaded and gave us the file on a paper form but in English language.
She mentioned that the man who was responsible for the website was simply absent and did not upload the file.
At the same time we decided to try the service’s ‘reflexes’ regarding the e-mails.
We sent an email on 12/12 in the morning and mentioned that we were having a problem with one insurance company and we need help.
The answer came on 16/12 emphasizing the need for a written consent from us in order to be able to conduct research!
At this point we will come back though, giving you more information about how these people handle the complaints, even serious ones concerning health! With evidence and names of course!
Her Majesty Mrs. Natar:
On Thursday 12/12/2013, through telephone, we askedr to make an appointment with Victpria Natar. We contacted her secretary explaining exactly who we are and what we want. On the next day (Friday 13/12), we contacted her again to see what was going to happen. We never got a clear answer, not even a negative one.
Apparently Mrs. Natar thinks that she leads a kingdom and she acts the way she wants.
Obviously someone should explain to Mrs. Natar that from her position she has an obligation to inform the public, unless she is hiding for other reasons. We will be waiting until we get some answers.
Just to note, the European Commissioner responded to a related request we had after a few hours. Obviously he was less busy than Mrs. Natar.
1.The issue is too serious for measures not to be taken Mr. Finance Minister.
This Report of 2012 cannot be posted on the Authority’s website in December 2013, after our intervention.
2.This Report cannot be written only in English.
3.Superintendent’s office must not to be inaccessible and nonexistent.
4.Data for Companies must be available.
5.Their accounts must not be hidden.
6. There should be reports showing analytically the breakdown of pending claims of each Company.
7. Companies with a suspicious ‘past’ should not be allowed to grow sharply the Car’s Insurance rate.
And 2 more questions Mr. Georgiades:
A.Why there is not a reference to the 1000 pages of Mr. Giorkajii’s Annual Report for Insurance, for the years 2011-2012? The only reference to this is that the service’s market analogy is very high.
B.How the reserves of the General Sector were reduced from 808 million in 2011 to 440 million in 2012?
Stay tuned because 24H serial has just begun…
