LINCOLN NATIONAL CORP

The Group Protection segment offers group non-medical insurance products and services, including short- and long-term disability, statutory disability and paid family medical leave administration and absence management services, term life, dental, vision and accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity benefits and services to the employer marketplace through various forms of employee-paid and employer-paid plans. Group Protection markets its products and services to employer groups of all sizes, from small companies with fewer than 100 employees to large employers with 10,000 or more employees.

Disability Insurance and Services

We offer insured coverage for, as well as administrative services for employer self-funded, short- and long-term employer-sponsored group and voluntary disability insurance, which protects an employee against loss of wages due to illness or injury. Short-term disability insurance generally provides weekly benefits for up to 26 weeks following a short waiting period, ranging from 1 to 30 days. Long-term disability insurance provides benefits following a longer waiting period, usually between 90 and 180 days, and provides benefits for a longer period, up to normal (Social Security) retirement age. The monthly benefits provided are subject to reduction when Social Security benefits are also paid. We also provide insured coverage for, as well as administrative services for employer self-funded, state-specific statutory disability and paid family leave programs.

Absence Management

We offer a robust portfolio of absence management services to help employers manage their state and federal family medical and company leave programs (paid and unpaid), as well as accommodation services that help employers identify accommodations that could be made to help claimants return to work (e.g., assistive devices, ergonomic assessments, etc.). Our comprehensive and compliant solutions, with ease of intake, provide coordinated and integrated management expertise to handle both leave and disability events.

Life Insurance

We offer employer-sponsored group term life insurance products including basic, optional, and voluntary term life insurance to employees and their dependents. Additional benefits may be provided in the event of a covered individual’s accidental death or dismemberment.

Dental and Vision

We offer a variety of employer-sponsored group dental insurance plans, which cover a portion of the cost of eligible dental procedures for employees and their dependents. Products offered include: indemnity coverage, which does not distinguish benefits based on a dental provider’s participation in a network arrangement; Preferred Provider Organization (“PPO”) products, on an insured and administrative services only basis, that do reflect the dental provider’s participation in the PPO network arrangement, including an agreement with network fee schedules; a Dental Health Maintenance Organization product that limits benefit coverage to a closed panel of network providers; an in-network-only option that limits benefit coverage to providers in certain states; and self-funded options for groups with more than 200 employees.

We also offer comprehensive employer-sponsored fully insured vision plans with a wide range of benefits for protecting employees’ and their covered dependents’ sight and vision health. All plans provide access to a national network of providers, with in and out-of-network benefits.

Accident, Critical Illness and Hospital Indemnity Insurance

We offer employer-sponsored group accident insurance products for employees and their covered dependents. This product is predominantly purchased on an employee-paid basis. Accident insurance provides scheduled benefits for over 30 types of benefit triggers related to accidental causes, including sports-related injuries, and is available for non-occupational accidents exclusively or on a 24-hour coverage basis.

We also offer employer-sponsored group critical illness insurance to employees and their covered dependents. This product is predominantly purchased on an employee-paid basis. The coverage provides for lump sum payouts upon the occurrence of one of the specified critical illness benefit triggers covered within a critical illness insurance policy. This product also includes benefits and services that assist employees and their family members in the prevention, early detection and treatment of critical illness events.

We also offer hospital indemnity insurance as part of our suite of supplemental health solutions. Similar to our employer-sponsored group accident and critical illness insurance, hospital indemnity is offered to employees and their covered dependents and is predominantly purchased on an employee-paid basis. Hospital indemnity insurance provides scheduled benefits for hospital admission and daily confinement, as well as over 20 benefit triggers related to hospitalization due to an accident and/or illness.

The Group Protection segment’s products are marketed primarily through a national distribution system. The managers and marketing representatives develop business through employee benefit brokers, consultants, and other employee benefit firms that work with employers to provide access to our products

The group protection marketplace is very competitive. Principal competitive factors include product features, price, quality of customer service and claims management, technological capabilities, quality and efficiency of distribution and financial strength ratings. In this market, the Group Protection segment competes nationally with a number of major companies and regionally with other companies offering all or some of the products within our product set. In addition, there is competition in attracting brokers to actively market our products and attracting and retaining sales representatives to sell our products. Key competitive factors in attracting brokers include product offerings and features, financial strength, support services and compensation.

Underwriting

The Group Protection segment’s underwriters evaluate the risk characteristics of each employer group. Generally, the relevant characteristics evaluated include employee census information (such as age, gender, income and occupation), employer industry classification, geographic location, benefit design elements and other factors. The segment employs detailed underwriting policies, guidelines and procedures designed to assist the underwriter to properly assess and quantify risks. Individual underwriting techniques (including evaluation of individual medical history information) may be used on certain covered individuals selecting benefit amounts that are above guarantee issue limits set forth in the insurance policies. For voluntary and other forms of employee paid coverages, minimum participation requirements are used to obtain a better spread of risk and minimize the risk of anti-selection.

Claims Administration

Claims for the Group Protection segment are managed by claim specialists. Claims are evaluated for eligibility and payment of benefits pursuant to the group insurance contract or self-insured plan and in compliance with federal and state laws and regulations. Efficient and accurate disability claims management is especially important to customer service satisfaction and segment results. Financial results can be impacted by both the incidence and the length of approved disability claims. The segment employs a variety of clinical experts, including employee and contract medical professionals and rehabilitation specialists, to evaluate medically supported functional capabilities and to assist in the development of return to work plans. The accuracy and speed of life claims are important customer service and risk management factors. Some life policies include a waiver of premium provision in the event of the insured’s disability. Dental claims management focuses on assisting plan administrators and members with the rising costs of insurance by utilizing tools to optimize dental claims payment accuracy through advanced claims review and validation, improved data analysis, enhanced clinical review of claims and provider utilization monitoring.