Insurance agents have had it good. So far. The Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority’s (PFRDA) decision to scrap commission of the agents within two years is causing a lot of unease in the agent community.
(This story appears in the 23 October, 2009 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)
PFRDA's suggestion may be suitable for a country with 100% literacy but not for India where most of the people are not literate to understand the financial literacy. Is Mr Swaroop feeling that insurance agents just need to sit on a chair?
on Dec 7, 2009I do not think that the Govt or the SEBI have the guts to go ahead and do to Insurance what they did with Mutual Funds. <br /> Mutual Funds, despite of AMFI (which is hand in glove with Mr.Bhave), are voiceless and toothless. <br /> Whereas Insurance has a powerful Agents body and has good political support.
on Nov 29, 2009PFRDA is the last and least body to say about insurance agent's commission. Finance ministry has not entrusted PFRDA to say anything about the whole industry. Ofcourse its chairman may have given a suggestion, but it is only a consultative paper and not binding on the whole industry. Remember that there are IRDA, RBI etc. to consult with and they are directly involved with this issue unlike PFRDA or its chairman. Your reporting was quoted as PFRDA as the authoritative body, which is wrong.
on Oct 15, 2009