Non-life insurance claims may reach P10.8b

LOCAL insurers are likely to get hit with more than $236 million (nearly P10.8 billion) in non-life claims alone from the devastating floods caused by storm Ondoy, an industry association said yesterday.

The storm, which killed 337 people in and around Manila and displaced 4.1 million others two weeks ago, was likely the costliest natural disaster to hit the country since the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo, Philippine Insurers and Reinsurers Association official Mario Valdez told the Agence France-Presse.

A preliminary survey of the industry’s four largest players as well as a medium-sized firm estimated that there would be P1 billion worth of claims for water-logged vehicles, he said.

“The industry estimates property claims would be at least 10 times that,” Valdez said.

A major pharmaceutical chain, a tobacco manufacturer, and a food processing company were among those hard-hit by the floods, he said.

He gave no estimates from life insurance claims. Officials of the Philippine Life Insurance Association could not be reached for comment.

Valdez said the 90 companies that make up the industry association had a combined net assets of P57 billion and could absorb the impact of the disaster.

He said the local insurers themselves only carried 10 percent of the risk, with 90 percent spread out to local and foreign reinsurance companies. –AFP