Important Levinson News and Updates – 6/3/24 Wellabe
Wellabe
Important announcement regarding Final Expense
Wellabe is committed to offering products and services that add value to our customers and distribution partners, align with our brand, and generate long-term sustainability. Sometimes this means we need to lean into new opportunities, such as annuities, and sometimes this means we need to stop doing things that are causing more harm than good. Given the ongoing performance and quality issues with Final Expense (FE), we’ve decided to stop offering FE products as part of our product portfolio, effective August 31, 2024. This change does not impact any Wellabe products underwritten by Medico® Insurance Company.
The last day to submit new FE applications will be August 31, 2024.
We will no longer advance FE agent commissions after June 30, 2024.
We understand you may be disappointed by this news. Please know this was not an easy decision. We’ve been actively working with our distribution partners to address poor quality of business but have only seen incremental improvement. Continued low taken rates, billing issues, poor persistency, and fraud were indicative of a product not well-suited to meeting the needs of our customers and therefore not aligned with the Wellabe brand. Moreover, efforts to address poor quality of business resulted in significant loss of scale and elevated expense margins, detracting from profitability.
We assure you Wellabe remains financially strong, and we recently received affirmation from AM Best of our A (Excellent) ratings. To ensure we maintain our excellent financial foundation and position our company for future success, we need to make sure we are investing our resources and capital on products and services that contribute to sustainable, profitable growth; deliver on our brand promise; and add value to our customers, distribution partners, and our organization. We’ve always been committed to doing what’s right, even when the right thing is not the easy thing.
As we move forward, we remain committed to doing what is right for our distribution partners and customers. This means we’ll continue to pay commissions when policies are renewed. We’ll also provide quality customer service to policyholders and pay claims as they are received. Because of this, there is no reason for you to find a new FE plan for your clients. If you decide to take this action, you’ll be held responsible for paying your debt to us, and if the debt is not paid, you’ll be reported to Vector One.
