Preliminary Term
Life insurance accounting method that does not require any terminal reserve for a policy at the end of the first year. First-year policy acquisition expenses, such as agent commission, medical examination, and premium tax, are often too large to leave enough of the end-of-the-year premium for addition to the premium reserve required under state full valuation reserve standards. In order to avoid taking the difference between the amount of the premium remaining and the required addition to reserves out of the insurance company's surplus account, the full preliminary term reserve valuation method is sometimes used. This leaves more of the premium available to cover acquisition cost and first-year claims.
Popular Insurance Terms
Annual contributions to a pension plan that exceed or are smaller than the minimum required for future employee benefits currently being earned; and any supplemental liability for past ...
Combination of the funds of many policyholders held in a single account and invested as a single entity. ...
Contractual rights to a stipulated percentage of the increase in the value of an insurance agency over a given future period of time. They are used to convey a percentage of the increase in ...
Securities that derive their value from other financial instruments that are used by the insurance company to hedge its bets on which direction the market is moving. For example, cattle ...
Cash carried forward from the previous year, plus gains from operations for the current year, plus any capital gains. ...
Central (main) office of an insurance company whose facilities usually include actuarial, claims, investment, legal, underwriting, agency, and marketing departments. ...
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Time at which life insurance death proceeds or endowments are paid, either at the death of an insured or at the end of the endowment period. ...
Method of selling insurance in which the insured purchases the product directly from the insurance company and not through an agent. ...

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