At present, the insurance industry is in a period of rapid development, and the risk factors it faces are more complicated. However, the supervision and enforcement measures stipulated in the current Insurance Law are not perfect, and the illegal cost of market participants is too low. Therefore, it is necessary to revise and improve the insurance law and increase the punishment for illegal acts. "In 2005, China's insurance industry ranked 1 1 in the world, and now it ranks second in the world. Pursuing the goal of becoming bigger and stronger has become history. Improving quality, maturity and stability will become a new direction for the development of insurance industry in China. " In response to the revised draft of the Insurance Law, Yu Haichun, Party Secretary and Vice President of the Law School of the University of International Business and Economics, told the rule of law weekend reporter. He said that the continuous improvement of the insurance law is the internal guarantee for the steady development of the insurance industry in China. The revision of "Insurance Law" will closely follow the changes in the market situation, and intensify efforts to deal with chronic diseases that have plagued the insurance market for a long time. In addition, there are many new terms such as "hesitation period" and "insurance consumer" in the draft for comments. 10 On the morning of June 5438+04, the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council announced the Decision on Amending the Insurance Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) (draft for comments) (hereinafter referred to as the draft for comments). The reporter checked the relevant information and found that 24 articles were revised, 1 was deleted, 54 articles were revised, and 208 articles in 9 chapters were revised. In principle, this revision has further relaxed and improved the risk supervision of insurance companies. Laws and regulations on life insurance, property insurance, capital utilization, supervision and punishment were revised. Chen Fei, an associate professor at the School of Law of the Central University of Finance and Economics, told the reporter that this revision is the third since the implementation of People's Republic of China (PRC) Insurance Law 1995. The first revision was made in 2002. At that time, in order to meet the requirements of China's accession to the WTO, the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) made a small-scale revision of the insurance law, focusing on the insurance clauses inconsistent with WTO rules. The second revision was made in 2009, with great efforts, focusing on strengthening the protection of the interests of the insured and the insured, with emphasis on the insurance contract. "20 15 this time mainly focuses on the revision of insurance regulatory provisions, and the revision of legal provisions of insurance contracts also has bright spots." Li Bin, a lawyer of Beijing Zhongshengsheng Law Firm who has been engaged in insurance litigation for a long time and a member of the Insurance Professional Committee of Beijing Lawyers Association, believes that the amendment of the Insurance Law is of great significance. He told the rule of law weekend reporter that the insurance industry in China has developed rapidly in recent years. At present, the scale of China's insurance assets has exceeded 10 trillion. The number of insurance market participants in China is increasing, reaching nearly 200. However, for a long time, under the influence of the idea of becoming bigger and stronger, the insurance market regarded premium as a hero, which led some small and medium-sized insurance companies to resort to unscrupulous means in product marketing in order to increase premium income, leading to many problems such as misleading sales, difficult claims settlement and information leakage in the development of the insurance industry, which brought a serious credit crisis to the insurance market. The problems reflected by Li Bin are reflected in this exposure draft. The exposure draft pointed out that "in recent years, China's insurance market has developed rapidly, and the internal and external environment has undergone great changes. It is necessary to amend the insurance law. Some media commented that at present, the insurance industry is in a period of rapid development and the risk factors it faces are more complicated. However, the supervision and enforcement measures stipulated in the current insurance law are not perfect enough, and the illegal cost of market participants is too low. Therefore, it is necessary to revise and improve the insurance law and increase the punishment for illegal acts. " In addition, according to Yu Haichun, an associate professor at university of international business and economics Insurance Institute, the revision of the insurance law is also a signal that China's insurance market is actively in line with international standards. Under the influence of global consumer protectionism, China's insurance legislation is constantly strengthening the protection of insurance consumers' rights and interests. Strengthen the protection of insurance consumers. One of the highlights of this exposure draft is the legal system of the hesitation period of life insurance contracts. Article 48 of the exposure draft makes it clear that "a life insurance contract with an insurance period of more than one year shall stipulate a hesitation period. The applicant has the right to terminate the insurance contract within the hesitation period, and the insurer shall refund all the insurance premiums in time. The hesitation period shall be counted from the date when the insured signs the insurance policy, and shall not be less than 20 days. " A number of industry experts said that adding the hesitation period law is the progress of the Insurance Law in protecting consumers' legislation, which is conducive to consumers making more rational choices after learning more about insurance products. However, Li Bin, who is engaged in legal practice, put forward the opposite opinion. "I personally think that after the hesitation period, it may have an adverse impact on insurance consumers." Li Bin told reporters that the premise of giving insurance consumers a hesitation period by law is that they believe that consumers should be able to "fully understand" the purchased insurance products, and ask consumers to raise objections in time during the hesitation period, "otherwise it means that consumers fully recognize the insurance contract". However, in practice, many consumers do not pay attention to the interpretation of product information or are misled by sales after getting the insurance contract. They often put the problem on hold for a year or two until the second payment period, but it is too late to regret it. Li Bin said: "The premise of setting the hesitation period not only requires the insured to know the contents of the contract in time, but also requires the market subject to stress rules and integrity. It needs to be improved at the level of the entire insurance market. " "The implementation effect of the hesitation period may be worse, but this system is necessary." Yu Yuchun believes that the hesitation period conforms to the general trend of the development of the insurance industry, and the existing problems can be further discussed. Yu Yuchun put forward some suggestions on the hesitation period method. "Signing an insurance policy and signing a contract are not the same thing." Yu Yuchun pointed out that the exposure draft shows that "the hesitation period starts from the date when the insured signs the insurance policy". However, in practice, the time when the policy is signed and the time when the contract is established is not the same. Insurance companies often stipulate the time when the contract is established in the insurance clauses, such as "the contract will be established from the date when the insurance premium is paid in full". This will lead to the invalidation of the contract, because the consumer is in arrears with part of the premium. So the hesitation period doesn't count. In addition, "the concept of insurance consumers is a real bright spot." Yu Yuchun told reporters that the concept of insurance consumers has been studied and discussed in academic circles for a long time. This concept was cited in the Opinions on Accelerating the Development of Modern Insurance Service Industry issued by the State Council in April, 2065-438 and in many documents of the China Insurance Regulatory Commission. It is natural to include it in the insurance law now. "But this does not mean that when there is a dispute between an insurance consumer and an insurance company, the court can invoke the Consumer Protection Law." Yu Haichun said, "When the Consumer Protection Law was revised last time, we made suggestions to explicitly include insurance consumers in the scope of application of the law. However, because insurance consumers are not ordinary consumers and the definition and details are complicated, the legislature failed to pass our opinion. The concept has been put forward, and how to protect it remains to be discussed. " Deregulation is beneficial to small and medium-sized insurance companies. The reporter noted that in the revision of the Insurance Law, an obvious trend is the deregulation of market players. The first article of the exposure draft clearly puts forward "deregulation, reform and innovation, and release the market development momentum." Among them, the relaxation of business control mainly involves two new regulations. "First, increase annuity insurance within the scope of life insurance business and increase annuity business within the scope of insurance company business; Secondly, broaden the channels for the use of insurance funds, allow insurance funds to invest in equity, insurance asset management products and use financial derivatives for risk management. " In Li Bin's view, deregulation will help promote the development of the entire insurance industry. At present, for a large number of small and medium-sized enterprises flooding into the insurance market, its commercial reputation is difficult to compare with that of large insurance companies such as China Life Insurance. Therefore, we should turn to insurance products with higher premiums and relatively low protection as our main business, such as annuity insurance. However, institutional obstacles have brought many obstacles to the product structure transformation of insurance companies. The revision of the Insurance Law has legally recognized this change in business structure and dredged the channels for enterprise development. "Insurance companies are also facing the problem of maintaining and increasing the value of funds." Li Bin believes that when a large amount of funds enter, insurance companies will have stronger investment demand. However, the Insurance Law has many restrictions on investment channels, and some enterprises have reduced profits because of cumbersome procedures, high expenses and poor management. It is clearly stated in this revision that broadening the scope of insurance funds will greatly reduce the economic pressure of enterprises and promote a virtuous circle of insurance enterprises' operation. At the same time, some insurance experts are worried about the tendency of deregulation in the exposure draft. Yu Yuchun told the rule of law weekend reporter that the direction of deregulation has indeed left a lot of room for development for the use of funds by insurance companies. This means that in practice, major forms of equity investment no longer need the State Council's approval. It not only greatly saves the examination and approval procedures, but also reflects the country's trust in the main body of the insurance market. However, some major equity investments, such as overseas investments, will infringe on the rights and interests of insurance consumers once the supervision is not in place because of the huge amount involved. Yu Haichun said: "In these aspects, the exposure draft did not specify whether major equity investments need administrative permission from relevant departments such as the State Council." In addition to deregulation, the illegal cost of insurance companies has increased, and the revision of the Insurance Law has increased the punishment for illegal acts. Taking the difficulty of property insurance claims as an example, Article 124 of the Exposure Draft first proposed that "the insurance company and its staff have to fulfill the obligation of compensation or payment of insurance benefits agreed in the insurance contract within the prescribed or agreed time limit". Corresponding to Article 179, it is clear that "anyone who commits one of the acts specified in Article 124 shall be ordered by the insurance supervision and administration institution to make corrections and be fined between RMB 200,000 and RMB 6,543.8+RMB 0,000." The current punishment is 50 thousand yuan to 300 thousand yuan. "The increase of this law has greatly strengthened the punishment and is conducive to correcting chaos." Li Bin said that Article 25 of the current Insurance Law stipulates that "if the amount of compensation or payment of insurance benefits cannot be determined within 60 days from the date when the insurer receives the request for compensation or payment of insurance benefits and relevant certificates and materials, the amount that can be determined according to the existing certificates and materials shall be paid first; After the insurer finally determines the amount of compensation or payment of insurance benefits, it shall pay the corresponding difference. " "But a close reading reveals that in this law, the regulatory authorities are not explicitly given the right to punish. As a result, property insurance companies often delay compensation, forcing the insured to accept unreasonable compensation and seek violence from it. On the other hand, some insurance consumers don't know that they have the right to claim compensation, and they don't know which regulatory agency should punish the illegal insurance institutions. The problem of property insurance claims has been difficult to solve for a long time. " "Unless there is a major accident or media focus, it is possible for insurance companies to better fulfill their obligation to pay in advance." Li Bin said that after the explosion accident in Tianjin Port (6007 17, Guba), PICC China Tianjin Branch paid 20 million yuan on the fourth day of the accident. However, at present, PICC's advance payment amount has been delayed due to the fact that the settlement case of a wood processing factory he represents has little impact. According to the rule of law weekend reporter, in many insurance dispute cases, the insured is often forced to accept the unfair amount of claims issued by the insurance company. On the other hand, even if the insured wins the case, the compensation of the insurance company is limited to the compensation that should be paid. For insurance consumers, the economic loss of legal fees and lost time is huge. Insurance companies have their own professional legal team, and there is no difference between pre-litigation payment and post-litigation payment of insurance claims. "This problem is very prominent in practice." Li Bin said, "This insurance law is clear. If the insurance company fails to fulfill its statutory obligations or contractual obligations according to law, then the regulatory authorities can impose penalties, which is a good thing for many insurance consumers. " "A fine of hundreds of thousands is nothing for some well-run insurance companies, but it is a big deal for insurance companies to pay consumers 20,000 yuan." Yu Yuchun believes that the regulatory authorities need to increase relief measures for consumers while punishing the infringement of the insurance market. It is clear in the exposure draft that the insurance supervision and management institution will correct the illegal unit and impose a fine, and the amount will be increased from 50,000 to 200,000 to 1 10,000, but there is no mention of compensation measures for the insured. Yu Yuchun suggested that the legislature establish an insurance consumer protection law as a useful supplement to the insurance law. "