Life Insurance and Retirement Savings Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Insurance advisers, Bancassurance relationship managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 16 Nov 2026 Course code SD-BI-130

Before you join: Participants should have basic familiarity with retail banking, insurance, pensions or personal financial products.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Life insurance and retirement savings products sit at the point where household financial security, long-term investment and regulated advice meet. Professionals must explain policy benefits accurately, assess protection and retirement income gaps, distinguish product risks, and maintain sound records through underwriting, servicing, claims and review. Errors can lead to unsuitable cover, lapsing policies, inadequate retirement income, conduct failures and customer complaints.

This course develops working knowledge of life insurance and retirement savings arrangements. Participants examine term assurance, whole life, endowment, unit-linked policies, annuities, defined benefit and defined contribution pensions. They apply protection-gap analysis, income replacement ratios, retirement cash-flow projections and basic asset-allocation principles. The course also addresses underwriting, premium construction, claims handling, policy administration, suitability, disclosure, vulnerable-customer treatment, IFRS 17 concepts and solvency capital.

Teaching combines concise instructor briefings with insurance and pension cases, policy-document reviews, group analysis, calculations and simulated client or operational decisions. Participants work with realistic situations such as a family requiring income protection, an employee transferring pension savings, a bank referral to an insurance adviser, and a claim involving disclosure concerns. They leave with a reusable life insurance and retirement savings assessment pack containing fact-find, needs-analysis, retirement projection, product-comparison and annual-review templates.

The course is suited to insurance, bancassurance, pension, finance, customer-service and compliance professionals who already work with retail financial products or need to interpret them confidently. It is particularly valuable for staff whose responsibilities include explaining policies, supporting advisers, managing customer portfolios, reviewing product suitability or monitoring insurance and pension operations.

What you will be able to do

  • Assess life insurance protection gaps using income replacement, debt and dependency analysis
  • Compare term, whole-life, endowment, unit-linked and annuity product structures
  • Apply underwriting evidence and risk-classification principles to insurance proposals
  • Construct retirement income projections using inflation, longevity and withdrawal assumptions
  • Evaluate defined benefit and defined contribution pension arrangements against member needs
  • Prepare suitability records using fact-find, disclosure and replacement-analysis methods
  • Interpret IFRS 17 insurance liability concepts and solvency capital risk drivers
  • Produce an annual policy and retirement savings review plan with documented actions

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Explain life insurance benefits, exclusions, charges and policy options with greater accuracy
  • Assess whether household protection cover matches debt, income and dependency needs
  • Build retirement income estimates that account for inflation, longevity and withdrawals
  • Recognise unsuitable replacement, disclosure and vulnerable-customer risks before escalation
  • Contribute more confidently to policy reviews, claims discussions and pension member conversations

For your organisation

  • Improve consistency of life insurance and retirement savings needs assessments
  • Reduce unsuitable sales risk through stronger fact-find and disclosure records
  • Increase policy persistency through clearer customer explanations and timely annual reviews
  • Strengthen claims, servicing and complaint handling through better policy interpretation
  • Improve management reporting on underwriting, lapse, longevity and capital risk drivers

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can explain how life insurance and retirement savings arrangements address financial protection and income needs.

  • Life insurance risk pooling, mortality protection and contractual risk transfer principles
  • Distinguishing protection, savings and retirement income within customer financial plans
  • Policyholder, insurer, reinsurer and intermediary roles mapped through policy lifecycle
  • Term assurance, whole life, endowment and unit-linked product characteristics
  • Social security pillars and employer pension arrangements compared systematically
  • Interest rates, longevity and inflation as retirement savings drivers
  • Reading benefit illustrations, policy schedules and key contractual definitions accurately

Participants can compare major life insurance and annuity products against stated customer needs.

  • Death benefit, cash value and surrender value mechanics compared
  • Level, renewable and decreasing term cover matched to liabilities
  • Whole-life premiums, guarantees and participating policy bonuses explained
  • Endowment maturity values and savings discipline assessed against stated goals
  • Unit-linked fund choice, charges and market risk disclosed clearly
  • Riders for disability, critical illness and waiver of premium evaluated
  • Immediate, deferred and escalating annuity payment options contrasted

Participants can interpret underwriting inputs and explain the main drivers of life insurance pricing.

  • Underwriting evidence includes medical history, occupation, lifestyle and financial information
  • Risk classification uses standard, rated, declined and exclusion decisions
  • Mortality tables and expected claims used in premium-rate construction
  • Expense loading, investment return and profit margin within premium calculations
  • Sum assured limits tested against income, debt and insurable interest
  • Adverse selection and moral hazard controlled through underwriting rules
  • Reinsurance treaties and facultative placement used for large exposures

Participants can manage key policy servicing and claims controls across the insurance policy lifecycle.

  • Proposal forms, disclosure duties and policy inception controls reviewed
  • Grace periods, lapses, reinstatements and non-forfeiture options administered
  • Claims notification, evidence requirements and benefit determination workflow mapped
  • Contestability clauses, exclusions and fraud indicators assessed during claims
  • Beneficiary nominations, assignments and trust arrangements documented correctly
  • Service-level measures track turnaround times, complaints and persistency
  • Root-cause analysis separates process failure from conduct risk

Participants can interpret common pension plan designs and assess their implications for members.

  • Defined benefit, defined contribution and hybrid pension promises compared
  • Accrual rates, vesting schedules and preservation rules interpreted
  • Employer matching formulas and contribution limits calculated accurately
  • Portability, transfers and consolidation decisions assessed for mobile employees
  • Retirement ages, early-retirement reductions and deferred pension increases modelled
  • Public pension entitlements incorporated into household retirement income estimates
  • Trustee, sponsor, administrator and custodian accountabilities distinguished

Participants can prepare and test a retirement income projection using stated assumptions.

  • Income replacement ratio estimates retirement income targets from current earnings
  • Cash-flow projections incorporate inflation, wage growth and retirement timing
  • Longevity scenarios test funding adequacy beyond average life expectancy
  • Asset allocation aligns equities, bonds and cash with time horizon
  • Sequence-of-returns risk tested for portfolios entering retirement drawdown
  • Withdrawal-rate assumptions compare fixed, flexible and annuity-led income approaches
  • Fees, tax treatment and fund performance assessed using net returns

Participants can document insurance and retirement savings recommendations using defensible suitability controls.

  • Fact-find records capture objectives, dependants, affordability and existing cover
  • Needs analysis quantifies protection gaps using income replacement and debt
  • Suitability assessments connect product features, risk tolerance and client objectives
  • Disclosure documents explain premiums, charges, exclusions, risks and cancellation rights
  • Replacement analysis compares surrender penalties, lost guarantees and new benefits
  • Vulnerable-customer indicators trigger communication, consent and escalation safeguards
  • Complaint files tested against fairness, timeliness and documented resolution standards
  • Conflicts, commissions and sales targets managed through conduct controls

Participants can explain key insurance reporting, asset-liability and capital concepts used by insurers.

  • IFRS 17 insurance revenue, service expense and liability concepts explained
  • Fulfilment cash flows separate expected claims, expenses and discounting
  • Contractual service margin releases unearned profit as insurance service occurs
  • Solvency capital links underwriting, market, credit and operational risks
  • Asset-liability matching considers duration, liquidity and guaranteed benefit obligations
  • Persistency, claims ratios and new-business margin monitored through management information
  • Stress tests quantify interest-rate, lapse and longevity sensitivity

Participants can identify distribution controls that support suitable insurance and retirement savings sales.

  • Bancassurance referral journeys separate banking needs from insurance recommendations
  • Distribution channels compared by advice scope, cost and customer ownership
  • Digital onboarding controls authenticate customers and preserve informed consent
  • Premium collection methods manage direct debit failure and collection risk
  • Customer segmentation identifies protection gaps across life stages
  • Campaign governance tests target criteria, scripts and post-sale monitoring
  • Data privacy requirements limit sensitive health and beneficiary information use
  • Cross-selling triggers checked against suitability and conduct requirements

Participants can conduct structured policy and retirement savings reviews and plan role-specific improvements.

  • Portfolio reviews reconcile in-force policies, beneficiaries and retirement accounts
  • Annual review triggers capture marriage, births, debt and employment changes
  • Policy performance reviews examine bonuses, fund returns, charges and lapses
  • Retirement readiness dashboard tracks funding ratio, projected income and gaps
  • Recommendation records document assumptions, alternatives, rationale and follow-up actions
  • Escalation criteria identify cases requiring actuarial, legal or tax specialists
  • Personal application plan sets workplace improvements, owners and review dates

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Life insurance fact-find template
  2. Protection-gap analysis worksheet
  3. Retirement income projection model
  4. Life policy comparison matrix
  5. Suitability and replacement checklist
  6. Annual policy review plan

Who should attend

  • Insurance advisers — assess protection and retirement needs before recommending products
  • Bancassurance relationship managers — identify customer needs and make appropriate insurance referrals
  • Pension administrators — explain plan rules, member options and retirement income implications
  • Insurance operations officers — administer policies, premiums, lapses and claims accurately
  • Compliance and conduct-risk staff — review suitability, disclosure and sales-control evidence
  • Finance and product staff — interpret insurance liabilities, profitability drivers and capital risks

Skills and tools covered

Protection needs analysisRetirement income modellingLife product comparisonInsurance underwritingSuitability documentationPolicy portfolio review

Tools and standards

IFRS 17, Solvency II, Income replacement ratio, Insurance fact-find

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to establish product, pension and regulatory concepts, followed by case work drawn from insurer, bank and employer pension settings. Participants review policy schedules, benefit illustrations, contribution records, underwriting evidence and retirement projections. Group exercises apply needs analysis, product comparison, claims assessment and suitability documentation methods. Simulations focus on customer conversations, referral decisions and annual policy reviews. Each participant prepares an application plan identifying actions, records and controls relevant to their role.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have basic familiarity with retail banking, insurance, pensions or personal financial products. They should be comfortable reading policy schedules, benefit illustrations, contribution statements and simple financial calculations involving percentages, cash flows and interest rates. Experience in customer service, sales support, insurance operations, pension administration, compliance or finance is useful. No actuarial qualification, investment-management background, advanced accounting knowledge or prior experience selling insurance is required. The course explains technical insurance and retirement terminology before applying it to decisions and records.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You should understand basic retail financial products and be comfortable with percentages, policy documents and simple cash-flow calculations. Prior insurance, pension or banking experience is useful, but actuarial knowledge is not required.

Bring a laptop or calculator if available, as the course includes retirement income and premium-related calculations. Participants may also bring anonymised policy schedules, pension statements or work scenarios for discussion where permitted by their employer.

The course suits insurance advisers, bancassurance staff, pension administrators, insurance operations teams, compliance officers and finance staff. It is designed for professionals who need practical product and retirement savings knowledge rather than actuarial specialist training.

This course focuses on life insurance contracts, retirement savings decisions, customer needs, policy servicing and conduct controls. It does not teach securities valuation, portfolio management in depth, actuarial reserving calculations or professional actuarial examination content.

Participants can use the fact-find, protection-gap, retirement projection and review tools when supporting customers, advisers or internal policy portfolios. The methods also help staff identify when cases require referral to underwriting, compliance, actuarial, legal or tax specialists.

The five days provide approximately 32.5 contact hours, normally from 08:30 to 16:30 each day. Time is allocated across ten connected modules, with product knowledge, retirement calculations, case analysis, documentation methods and application planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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