Tamahome closes insurance agency business due to fraudulent insurance claims

On the 14th, the company announced that it has filed a petition with a non-life insurance company to close down its insurance agency business due to an issue in which an employee of housing manufacturer Tama Home was making fraudulent claims for fire insurance benefits. The company also announced that it is considering conducting an investigation involving outside experts in parallel with the internal investigation it has conducted so far.

The company has been in the insurance agency business, selling insurance products from three non-life insurance companies to customers who have built custom homes. The company says it plans to transfer existing customers to another insurance agency, and the company says this is ``part of its efforts to regain the trust of customers and related parties.''

So far, the non-life insurance company has investigated the materials used in claims from Tama Home and identified cases where fraudulent claims were suspected. They have called on Tama Home to conduct an objective investigation by establishing a third-party committee made up of outside experts. However, the company said that the new investigation it announced today was an internal investigation involving experts, rather than a third-party committee.

Regarding Tama Home, it has been revealed that multiple employees at the Takamatsu branch (Kagawa Prefecture) made at least hundreds of false or inflated insurance claims by reusing the same photos.

In response to the fraudulent claims, Sompo Japan Insurance and Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance have announced plans to suspend new sales of fire insurance to Tamahome, and Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance, which also received fraudulent claims, is also considering suspending sales.

Tama Home did not disclose details, including whether there were any fraudulent charges, saying, ``There are many uncertainties at this point.''

The company was established in 1998. Registered as an insurance agent in 2002.