2025 SOA ImpACT Conference Virtual:Session 5A: Lost in Translation: A Tail of Volatile Mortality Experience-12.04.25 Recording

A simple average mortality slippage does not capture the increased volatility risk of accelerated underwriting programs. For decades, actuaries have had access to a robust pool of relevant, often fully credible mortality experience, derived from blocks of fully underwritten life insurance policies using an essentially uniform underwriting framework. This allowed them to produce reliable assumptions based on consistent datasets that easily translated to industry standards for medical evidence and underwriting rubrics. The result was an unprecedented level of precision in best estimate assumptions, leading to ever more competitive consumer rates in the market. As the industry transitions to accelerated underwriting-removing labs, exams and other requirements while adding various scores and digital evidence- how does the highly credible historical experience from fully underwritten business translate to the spectrum of accelerated underwriting mortality today? This presentation goes beyond average best estimates of mortality slippage and explores first-of-its-kind research from the PartnerRe team into the tail volatility risk presented by waiving fluid requirements, along with the potential ramifications for pricing and valuation within the accelerated context.