Taking a retrospective look at group income protection claims for 2015 and it emerges that for one leading UK policy provider, 30% of claims made were triggered by mental health issues, according to the website, www.employeebenefits.co.uk.
Examining the findings of Legal and General’s recent scrutinising of its own claims information for last year (and which was revealed of late to coincide with National Mental Health Awareness Week), it was also noted that through both making funds available for the appropriate treatment and early intervention, the potential far-ranging extent of some 80% of mental health absence notifications were alleviated; which ultimately led to employees making a welcome return to their place of work prior to a claim actually being pursued.
In terms of Legal and General, this impressive success rate became evident courtesy of the insurance provider laying on the priceless provision of over 6,000 individual psychological treatment sessions for policyholder during this passage of time.
Speaking with several news sources during National Mental Health Awareness Week, Legal and General’s Workplace Health and Protection MD, Martin Noone said; “Mental health issues are becoming increasingly commonplace in the UK and it is a topic that needs to be discussed much more often, making this week’s awareness campaign a vital part of encouraging people to discuss such issues openly.”
It’s understood that critical issues which affect policyholders’ mental health – including periods of stress, anxiety, depression and psychological orders – have accounted for the majority of group income protection insurance claims regarding Legal and General policyholders for the almost two decades now.
Pipping Even Back-related Problems to the Group Income Protection Claim Post, Mental Health Issues Recognised by One Leading Insurance Policy Provider as Being Largely Instrumental
Harking back to L&G’s more proactive stance on mental health, and the impacts of in the workplace (especially relating to group income protection claims) and in total it avoided having to pay-out on 595 claims of this nature in 2015, by way of spearheading initiatives which enabled employees to get back on their feet before feeling the need to lodge a claim.
Recorded as being up by 40% on the year before (ergo raising the overall success rate in terms of group income protection claims to an impressive 92%), the insurance policy provider confirmed that a sizeable volume of averted claims were achieved courtesy of what they describe as ’active intervention’ schemes being adopted.
Meanwhile we’ve also learnt that over 50% of human resources executives have needed to sanction mental health and stress counselling sessions to employees since 2014, which again serves as a timely reminder as to a need for increased awareness and support of a problem which affects significant numbers of the UK workforce, employed in a cross-section of sectors.
As part of a separate study carried out of late, two-thirds of the same fraction of HR execs polled agreed that mental health issues in an employment surround is a major concern from their perspective. A figure purported to be in the region of 53% of human resources staff have admitted to providing their own counselling sessions to disconsolate employees, which statistically amounts to more than double the number who’ve been roped in to settle staff disputes.
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