IC-22 Life Insurance Underwriting: Syllabus & Study Guide
IC-22 Life Insurance Underwriting is the life-stream compulsory paper at III Associateship level — the life-stream counterpart to IC-45 on the general side. If IC-02 introduced you to life products broadly, IC-22 goes deep on the single most consequential decision an insurer makes: whether, and on what terms, to accept a life risk.
Why life underwriting is different
Life underwriting isn't just about assessing a building or a vehicle — it's about assessing a person: their health, occupation, habits, and financial circumstances, over a policy term that can run decades. That combination of medical, financial and actuarial judgement is why it earns its own paper.
What the IC-22 syllabus covers
- Principles of life underwriting — the underwriter's objective (fair risk classification, not risk avoidance).
- Medical underwriting — how age, health history, family history and medical exams/reports factor into a decision.
- Non-medical underwriting — occupation, lifestyle (smoking, hazardous activities), financial underwriting (sum assured relative to income/net worth).
- Underwriting decisions — standard acceptance, rated (extra premium) terms, exclusions, postponement and decline, and what each means for the policyholder.
- The proposal form and disclosure — the proposer's duty to disclose material facts, and what happens when they don't.
- Reinsurance's role in life underwriting for larger sums assured.
High-value topics
- Medical vs non-medical underwriting factors. Learn to sort a list of factors (age, BMI, occupation, smoking, family history, income) into the right bucket — this shows up constantly.
- Underwriting decision types. Know the difference between a rated policy (extra premium for extra risk), an exclusion (a specific risk is excluded, standard premium otherwise), and postponement — these are easy marks once memorised precisely.
- Financial underwriting. Understand why sum assured is checked against income/net worth (to prevent over-insurance, which can create moral hazard).
- Duty of disclosure. This links back to utmost good faith from IC-01 — applied specifically to what a life proposer must reveal.
Common exam traps
- Mixing up rated terms and exclusions. A rated policy still covers the risk, at a higher premium; an exclusion removes cover for that specific risk only. Questions frequently swap these.
- Assuming underwriting is only medical. Non-medical and financial underwriting are just as heavily tested, and easy to under-revise.
- Forgetting the "material fact" standard for disclosure — not everything needs disclosing, only what's material to the risk.
A study plan for IC-22
- Week 1: Principles of underwriting and medical factors — build a reference table of common conditions and how they're typically treated.
- Week 2: Non-medical and financial underwriting, then the decision types (rated/exclusion/postponement/decline).
- Week 3: Disclosure, proposal forms and reinsurance's role, then start mixed MCQs.
- Final days: Full-length mocks focused on scenario questions — "given this proposer profile, what's the likely underwriting outcome?"
This paper rewards pattern recognition across many small scenarios, so volume of practice matters more than re-reading. On Certena you can practise IC-22 questions with explanations and follow a plan paced to your Associateship exam date.
Quick FAQ
Is IC-22 clinical/medical knowledge required? No — you need to know how underwriters use medical information, not medical science itself.
How does IC-22 relate to IC-26? They're both life-stream Associateship compulsories; IC-22 is about risk selection (underwriting), IC-26 is about the financial side (finance and actuarial basics).
The IC-22 syllabus and credit value are set by the Insurance Institute of India and may change by edition. Confirm the current syllabus on the official III website. Certena is an independent study app and is not affiliated with III or IRDAI.