Legal & General and Royal London have both announced that it will be reintroducing face-to-face medical screenings.
Royal London will resume requests medical screenings for protection applicants from Thursday 11 June, while L&G will do so on Monday 15 June.
Medicals Direct Group and Square Health, Royal London’s medical screening partners, have introduced safety controls in light of Covid-19 to ensure screenings are carried out in a way that minimises the risk to applicants. The new processes include the mandatory use of personal protection equipment and single use equipment wherever possible. All repeatedly used equipment, for example iPads, will be disinfected before every appointment.
Legal & General has also introduced a number of safety measures as it resumes face-to-face medical screenings. These include social distancing, where appropriate, and full Personal Protective Equipment to be used by all health professionals.
Craig Paterson, underwriting and claims philosophy manager at Royal London, said: “The safety and wellbeing of applicants is our utmost priority and we have worked closely with our medical screening partners to be able to resume offering face-to-face screening in a safe way. We are also currently reviewing the cases submitted previously that require a medical exam but couldn’t be carried out.
“As with all changes we’ve made as a result of Covid-19, we continue to closely monitor the situation and make further changes as required.”
Craig Brown, director intermediary, Legal & General, added:
“The health and wellbeing of our customers is our upmost priority and we have taken exceptional care in working with our medical partners to ensure that appropriate measures have been taken to safeguard our customers in face-to-face screenings. We will keep this under constant review in line with Public Health England and Government guidance and regulations.
“We hear from our customers that for many people, the importance of access to protection has never felt more essential. We are working very hard to ensure that we are able to safely and efficiently support new customers seeking to access protection at this incredibly worrying time.
“We would encourage all customers contacted by our medical partners to ensure that they ask any questions that they might have so that they are comfortable that they are fully aware of the safeguarding measures before proceeding with the examination. No question is too small. Our absolute purpose as a business is to support our customers at the most challenging time in their lives – this commitment is unchanged by Covid-19.”