The 2018/2019 Federal Budget issued in May 2018 proposed some significant changes to insurance cover within superannuation as part of its Protecting Your Superannuation Package.  As a result of the changes, a large proportion of superannuation fund members are expected to lose their insurance cover from 1 July 2019, when cover becomes opt-in for young members, those with low balances and inactive members.

A further implication is that opt-out premium rates will increase for the majority of members who retain cover.  We estimate that premium rates will increase on average by 11.1%, although the increase will vary considerably from fund to fund, depending on the benefit design, demographics of the membership and changes to terms and conditions to deal with switching cover on and off.

Our report providing more details is available below.