The jobs of around 40 Aegon UK employees are at risk following the sale of the firm’s UK individual protection book to Royal London, while outstanding pipeline applications have 30 days to be completed, the insurer has confirmed.
In a statement Aegon UK told Health & Protection that these employees were being supported and had been told their roles were at risk while consultation with the appropriate unions was ongoing.
The insurer added it was not accepting any new protection applications after 4 April 2023, and those already in progress will have 30 days to complete and after this time, any remaining in progress cases will be closed.
Royal London CEO Barry O’Dwyer told Health & Protection that the at risk employees would not be offered roles at the mutual as part of the transaction.
“The way that the transaction will work is that there will be a reinsurance agreement initially which will pass the economic profits and losses from the book onto us,” O’Dwyer explained.
“But it will be followed by a Part VII transfer which actually legally changes the ownership of the policies from Aegon to Royal London – that will take about 12 to 18 months.
“In the meantime, I believe Aegon are consulting with the people that they employ that are working on this business. But it’s important to note that the administration is outsourced to a third party so Aegon don’t directly employ the people that administer the business.
“Of course they directly employ the people that sell the business and they are the people most impacted currently, but there’s going to be no transfer of employees from Aegon to Royal London as a result of this deal.”
Aegon also confirmed the sale of its individual protection book has no impact on current policyholders and all current policy conditions will be honoured with no action required and any claims already started will be processed by Aegon in the usual way.