Protection product sales in the first three months of 2017 returned to the peak levels of 2016, according to analysis by Equifax Touchstone.
In the first quarter of the year protection sales rose by 6.6 per cent to £140.2m.
The data, collated from 22 protection providers with inputs from more than 11,000 advisers, revealed sales of decreasing term with critical illness policies grew most during the quarter, up by 15.9 per cent on the last quarter of 2016 to £13.5m.
This was closely followed by sales of term policies, which saw a 14.4 per cent increase.
| Quarterly breakdown by type of cover: | |
| | | | |
Type of cover | Q4 2016 | Q1 2017 | % change |
| Critical illness | 3762376 | 3924740 | 4.32 |
| Relevant Life | 2553146 | 2599257 | 0.0181 |
| Decreasing Term with CI | 11644813 | 13500643 | 15.94 |
| Income protection | 8930136 | 8424680 | -5.66 |
| Mortgage term | 21786358 | 21722787 | -0.29 |
| Term | 52122540 | 59603524 | 14.35 |
| Term with critical illness | 21507887 | 20951024 | -2.59 |
| Whole of life | 9259625 | 9499488 | 2.59 |
| Total | 131566881 | 140226144 | 6.58 |
John Driscoll, director at Equifax Touchstone, said: “Our quarterly analysis shows robust growth for protection product sales in the first quarter of 2017, with very encouraging increases across multiple products buoyed by a strong mortgage market in March.
“It is reassuring to see substantial increases in term assurance policies drive positive growth again, enabling protection volumes to return to the highest levels of last year.
“Despite ongoing uncertainty in the market, we’re hopeful that protection sales will continue this upward trend into the rest of 2017.”
The analysis showed critical illness, whole of life and relevant life policies did well, with sales increasing by 4.3 per cent, 2.6 per cent and 1.8 per cent respectively.
Three policy types saw drops in sales, with income protection suffering most, falling 5.7 per cent, followed by a decrease in term with critical illness of 2.6 per cent and a small decrease of 0.3 per cent for mortgage term.
damian.fantato@ft.com
