An aerial view of Hancock Place in Boston. (Photo: Richard Cavalleri)
John Hancock says it's now sold on the idea that building wellness incentives into life insurance policies leads the insureds to take better care of themselves.
The Boston-based company says it will put a wellness incentive program from Vitality into all new, and in-force, life insurance policies that the company provides.
(Related: Brooks Tingle to Lead John Hancock Insurance)
John Hancock — a unit of Manulife Financial Corp. — began including Vitality wellness incentive programs in some life insurance policies in 2015.
Discovery Ltd., the company that runs the Vitality program, helps John Hancock track how participants perform on metrics such as getting daily exercise, annual health screenings and flu shots.
John Hancock has been adjusting the program participants' premiums to reflect their performance on the wellness metrics.
John Hancock says policyholders who participate in the Vitality program have been taking about twice as many steps per day as the average American, and that those policyholders engage with the Vitality program about 576 times per year.
Traditional life insurance customers engage with the life insurance company an average of just once or twice per year, according to John Hancock.
Brooks Tingle, president of John Hancock Insurance, said in a statement that we now have smart phones, smart cars and smart homes.
"It's time for smart life insurance that meets the changing needs of consumers," Tingle said.
