Premium fall fails to spur general insurance

August April-August 2006-072007-082006-072007-08  Royal Sundaram44.7947.80245.11267.94 Tata-AIG62.3761.01343.49359.16 Reliance General59.34154.73273.54807.95 IFFCO-Tokio82.2461.51570.86458.51 ICICI-lombard248.06301.741284.521463.75 Bajaj Allianz125.41186.76713.57946.50 HDFC CHUBB15.7426.7876.5297.69 Cholamandalam23.7840.74128.08226.43 New India343.47350.822076.802194.17 National272.61295.381542.331666.71 United India260.02293.111488.981579.36 Oriental283.60288.541669.281712.32  Insurance companies in order to withhold existing clients and grab new customers have been competing with each other on price.  The premium rates for fire and engineering policies have dropped by more than 30 per cent, while discounts offered is over 20 per cent for motor own damage cover in case of private cars.  The eight private players collected a gross premium of Rs 4,627.93 crore, a growth of 27 per cent against a gross premium of Rs 3635.69 crore up to the month of August last year.  The four public sector players