The charter aims to “ensure claimants have the best support; a caring, efficient and hassle-free experience, with claims paid as quickly as possible”.
Best practices that are included in the charter are having a dedicated claims team with a phone-based claims process, no potential claimants being turned away by anyone not on the claims team, having a named point of contact, regular updates every two weeks, and brokers being notified of all claims when made.
Signatories used to offer the PDG Funeral Payment Pledge, ensuring money is paid to claimants within 72 hours and claim forms are assessed within three working days and medical evidence within five days.
The lender said this underlined its “commitment to delivering better customer outcomes in the protection insurance market”.
HSBC Life UK said it paid out £93m in life insurance and critical illness claims during 2024.
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The firm said it paid out 97.53% for life insurance claims and 94.44% for critical illness.
The average time to settle life insurance claims was 19 days in 2024, and the average for Q1 2025 stood at 13 days.
For critical illness claims, the turnaround time was 41 days in 2024, and in Q1 2025, this improved to 32 days.
Richard Waters, head of protection distribution at HSBC Life UK, said: “Our priority is to support and offer care to our customers and their loved ones at such challenging times in their lives. Retaining full status with the Protection Distributors Group demonstrates our commitment to providing the highest standards of customer care and reinforcing the value of our proposition.”
Last week, HSBC Life UK recruited more business development managers (BDMs) and launched a protection adviser team to grow its presence in the protection market.
