ULIP Excuses, and Why They Are Wrong

ULIP Excuses, and Why They Are Wrong

There are a set of reasons that ULIP apologists usually trot out to promote ULIPs. Here's why they are wrong.

ULIP Excuses, and Why They Are Wrong

The so-called turf-war on ULIPs that SEBI and IRDA have been fighting has now taken on a life of its own. In reality, just about the least important thing is who regulates ULIPs, while the most important thing-or rather, the only important thing-is that investors understand what they are getting into and make the choices that are best for them. I find that there's a great deal of misinformation floating around about ULIPs and why exactly are so many investment advisors so critical of them. ULIP proponents generally give a set of reasons which in their opinion invalidate criticism of ULIPs.

In this article, I'd like to briefly describe why I think these arguments are not valid.

Argument: ULIP expenses have been lowered by IRDA. ULIP expenses are now down to just 3 per cent for ULIPs of up to 10 years and 2.25 per cent for longer ones. Mutual funds, by comparison, have a higher fund management charges.

Reality: The way IRDA has framed the rules, 2.25 or 3 per cent is effectively the average over the entire lifetime of a ULIP. However, these charges are heavily front-loaded, something that allows insurance companies to circumvent them easily. During the first year, these charges are as high as 40 to 70 per cent. If the customer cannot continue with a policy for any reason, then his real expenses are far higher. And as it happens, a huge proportion of policies lapse during the earlier years. The front-loading has no logic, except to enrich insurers and agents. And fund management charges being lower than mutual funds is a not a full comparison. In mutual funds, total expenses are capped at 2.25 per cent for equity funds and less for other funds. These are not comparable to the fund management charges of ULIPs because ULIP customers also pay premium allocation charges, policy administration charges, mortality charges, and for guaranteed ULIPs, guarantee charge s. Comparing fund management cha ges alone is a joke.

Argument: ULIPs have led to a massive rise in insurance penetration in India.
Reality: Insurance means insurance, in the sense when the insured person dies, his family gets money to pay for food, rent and education. In a country with as little social security as ours, the growth of insurance has to mean the growth in the reach and quantum of risk cover for lives. To call ULIPs, a market risk-bearing product (with a tiny dose of insurance) by the name of insurance and then present it as evidence of the growth of insurance is simply dishonest, and to find a regulator appointed by the Government of India participating in this subterfuge is shameful.
Argument: The insurance industry provides a huge amount of employment. 30 lakh people have found work through insurance.

Reality: If ULIPs were a sound financial product than this would be wonderful news. Since they are not (see above reasons), this issue is a complete red herring. It is not the responsibility of ULIP customers to provide agents employment by giving away vast proportion of their premiums as commission. If crores of people's money has to be mis-invested to provide employment for lakhs of people, then it's better for those lakhs to find some other, more productive employment.

Argument: ULIP fund flows are important for the stock market and for infrastructure development.

Reality: The same as the employment argument. It is not the responsibility of ULIP customers to buy expensive and non-transparent investment products so that the stock markets can be boosted. Wouldn't it be possible to create infrastructure if ULIPs could be made more investor friendly.

I find the last two points to be particularly dishonest. They somehow imply that if ULIPs were made more investor-friendly, then lakhs of people would immediately become unemployed and money would stop flowing into development. However, ULIP critics like me have nothing against the concept of ULIPs. If ULIP cost is brought down and made non-front-loaded; and if transparency is enhanced to the level of other asset classes, then they would be a very good product. The fact that the ULIP's enforce gradual SIP-style investments could actually make them a superior product.

ULIPs should be converted into a product that has an investment component that has similar rules and regulations to mutual funds, in combination with an life-cover component that has the same pricing as term insurance. If this happens, then I'm sure that every opponent of ULIPs, including Value Research, will start recommending them above mutual funds.

-- Dhirendra Kumar
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