PhilCharter, Cocolife to insure OFWs

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine Charter Insurance Corp. (PhilCharter) and United Cocolife Assurance Corp. (Cocolife) have qualified, under very stringent standards, to undertake the compulsory insurance coverage for agency-hired overseas workers as directed by the Department of Labor and Employment.

Enacted early this year, RA 10022 provides that the OFWs insurance coverage should include a minimum of $15,000 for accidental death, $10,000 for natural death, $7,500 for permanent total disablement, $100 subsistence allowance benefit per month for a maximum of six months for a migrant worker who is involved in litigation proceedings in the receiving country, at least three months salary for every year of the migrant worker’s contract for money claims arising from the employer’s liability, free transportation cost for the compassionate visit of a member of the family or requested individual when a migrant worker is hospitalized or confined for seven consecutive days or more, medical evacuation and medical repatriation.

PhilCharter president Melecio Mallillin said that on April 22,2009, long before the enactment of RA 10022, a group of 59 non-life insurance companies out of the more or less 85 that are authorized to operate in the country have organized themselves into a group in order to enhance the then prevailing insurance package for the OFWs.

He said the compulsory insurance coverage, at no cost to the OFW, is a very deliberate and bold attempt at stomping out apprehensions of the misfortunes that may fall upon them while they are out of the country.

Cocolife president Alfredo Tumacder Jr. stated that with the advent of RA 10022 where the playing field of the new insurance undertaking has been clearly defined, some 22 life insurance companies, led by Cocolife, and having noted that the new law contains a natural death coverage which is well within the purview of life insurance, organized themselves and joined the aggrupation led by PhilCharter in a partnership that would ensure a very viable insurance program for the OFW. 

He emphasized that the combined resources of PhilCharter and Cocolife, as well as those of the insurance companies that have joined them as reinsurers, would clothe the OFW with the maximum insurance protection that the industry could offer.