The Life Insurance Settlement Association is asking why the Senate Special Committee on Aging shut it out of the life settlement hearing.
The committee held a hearing Wednesday with the title, "Betting on Death in the Life Settlement Market – What's at Stake for Seniors?"
Three state regulators and an independent financial services expert appeared on one panel on one panel of witnesses, and a second panel included representatives from the American Council of Life Insurers, Washington; Coventry First L.L.C., Fort Washington, Pa.; and Life Partners Inc., Waco, Texas.
The Coventry and Life Partners witnesses did a good of speaking up for the life settlement industry as a whole, but really, they had a responsibility to represent only the life settlement providers, not life settlement producers, life settlement investors or other interested parties, according to Doug Head, executive director of LISA, Orlando, Fla.
LISA, in contrast, represents about 30 life settlement providers, but it also represents more than 100 other members, including life settlement agents and brokers, Head said.
Some of the hearing participants blasted life settlement agents and brokers, Head noted.
At the hearing, "did you hearing anything from the life settlement brokers?" Head asked.
LISA has spent months working with Aging Committee staffers, but, in the end, they said including LISA simply would create a witness panel that was too big, Head said.
The staffers said they had to include Coventry and Life Partners, because other participants would be making specific criticisms of Coventry and Life Partners, and that they had to include the ACLI, because they had to have someone presenting the life insurance company point of view, Head said.
Limiting participation on the second panel to companies that were attacked directly by witnesses on the first panel was "entirely inappropriate," Head writes in a letter to Kohl that was sent Tuesday.
In the past, when the Aging Committee has held hearings on topics such as annuity sales and professional designations, it has brought in witnesses from producer groups, Head writes in the letter.
Additional information was contributed to this article by Allison Bell.
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