Equitable Fire Insurance Company
 |
|
|
Formerly called
|
National Loan Fund Life Assurance Society |
|---|---|
| Industry | Life insurance |
| Fate | Liquidation |
| Founded | 1837 |
| Founder | T. Lamie Murray |
| Defunct | 1869 |
| Headquarters | London |
|
Areas served
|
Great Britain, Ireland, France and North America |
The International Life Assurance Society was a 19th-century British insurance company. Its operations in the United States, particularly in the state of Massachusetts, caused it to play a major role in the development of insurance regulation in that country.
The Society was founded in 1837 under its original name, the National Loan Fund Life Assurance Society. The "Loan Fund" part of the name reflected the Society's practice of allowing insureds to borrow back a portion of their premiums, an unusual feature in its day but one that is now commonly practiced in the form of "policy loans". From the very start, the Society established a presence in the major cities of Britain and, within ten years, had done the same in Canada and the United States. By the mid 1850s, the Society had become the sixth largest insurance company in the United States and, by far, the largest British insurer operating there.
Signs of financial difficulties arose in the early 1850s. By then, the Society had changed its operating practices to reduce the amount of funds that could be borrowed by the policyholders. At about the same time, the Society's founder (T. Lamie Murray) left his leadership position, not only in the Society but also in a related enterprise (the Equitable Fire Insurance Company), doing so amidst allegations of financial improprieties. And towards the end of the decade, the Society faced difficulties from a different front. A new Massachusetts law required insurers to demonstrate that they were holding assets sufficient to meet their obligations to policyholders. The International was unable to satisfy the Massachusetts authorities on this point, largely because it insisted on using an actuarial methodology that was unacceptable to those authorities. This, in turn, sparked a debate that was played out in the general newspapers in the United States.
Similar difficulties soon arose with the newly-established insurance department of New York. This, along with generally difficult conditions related to the American Civil War, caused the Society to cease most of its operations in the United States by the mid 1860s. A few years later, the Society was placed under court-supervised liquidation in London. It ceased independent operations in 1869.
Throughout its existence, the Society was a party to various insurance-related litigation with policyholders or their beneficiaries. Several of those cases served to establish precedent in the application of insurance law. The most notable of them was Molton v. Camroux, which addressed the question of how contract law is applied in cases of insanity.
...
Wikipedia