Product Oversight & Governance - Product Approval Process and Target Market Statements

At Methodist Insurance, we have had a robust Product Oversight and Governance Policy in place for a number of years. In line with more recent regulatory changes, we have further enhanced this Policy. Below you can find an overview of our product development and review processes.

Here you can access the Target Market Statements for each of our products. These provide clarification of who the products are and are not designed for, as well as other important information you should know when placing business with us.

In addition, you can find our Fair Value Assessment Outcomes which demonstrate how we have assessed fair value, and the outcome of that assessment, for each of our products.

The key areas outlined below cover the various processes we have in place to design, approve and monitor our products as well as the information we may require from our distributors (brokers) throughout the lifecycle of a product.

The product development process has been designed to ensure that we have a consistent approach to the development of new or significantly adapted products and protects against our products having any potential to cause customer harm. The process comprises 6 stages:

The process allows for continual monitoring and decision-making throughout the journey, taking in to account a number of factors such as customer testing and an evaluation of fair value. Each product development project will have a core team of individuals assigned to it to ensure a balanced approach is taken.

The product review process has been designed to ensure that we assess our products against a range of factors and metrics, to check for any potential or actual customer harm, and to ensure we have the necessary controls in place to know when we need to take remedial action.

These reviews will be carried out annually (or more frequently as determined) to analyse product performance and to ensure each product continues to meet customer needs and provide ongoing fair value.

As part of the FCA rules we will continue to request information from distributors with whom we have an agency agreement to understand the value in the distribution chain and the impact of this on the customer.

We have produced a Target Market Statement for each of our products which provides relevant information to help you distribute these products appropriately within the target market.

For each of our products we have produced a Fair Value Assessment Outcome. These Outcome documents detail how and what we have assessed and the outcome for each product. 

Information analysed includes, but is not limited to:

• Product metrics and cover
• Service
• Pricing and premium finance
• Distribution

You will find the Target Market Statements and Fair Value Assessment Outcomes below.