Nan Shan Life Screws Agency

The National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) yesterday said that Nan Shan Life Insurance Co must contribute to its agents’ National Health Insurance premiums, after more than 100 members of the firm’s labor union protested outside the Executive Yuan.

Following a meeting between government officials and union representatives, union spokesman Chiu Chun-chi (邱俊祺) said the NHIA had agreed to fine the company if it failed to obey an order to begin contributing to premiums.

Chiu welcomed the NHIA’s decision, while calling for further steps to forgive previous government premium claims against workers, who had been liable for higher rates after the company refused to make contributions on the grounds that they were contracted workers rather than employees.

“The government should have enforced the law long ago, and they should re-examine why it was not applied sooner,” he said.

The NHIA’s decision followed a protest by more than 100 of the firm’s agents outside the Executive Yuan in Taipei, with union members raising their fists and accusing the government of “bouncing” electoral “checks” to address their situation.

Union members have been on strike since December last year over changes to evaluation procedures and benefits, following years of conflict and administrative lawsuits over how to define their employment status.

“[President] Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has to show the resolve to apply the law indiscriminately — there can be no separation of Labor Insurance and National Health Insurance,” union president Yan Ching-lung (嚴慶龍) said, adding that 1,700 of the union’s members were “orphans” in the National Health Insurance system, forced to apply through their vocational union because of the firm’s refusal to make contributions.Whether the agents should be considered contracted workers or full-time employees entitled to Labor Insurance and National Health Insurance has been a long-standing point of contention, with Nan Shan being forced to pay Labor Insurance premiums beginning in 2011 after losing an administrative lawsuit, union supervisor Liu Wei-yu (劉惟裕) said.

He said agents are forced to pay 60 percent of their National Health Insurance premiums while receiving coverage under their vocational union, double the percentage they pay when receiving coverage under a corporation. Corporations are obligated pay 60 percent of employee premiums with the government making up the difference.

Taipei City Confederation of Trade Unions chairwoman Cheng Ya-hui (鄭雅慧) said Nan Shan’s refusal to pay National Health Insurance premiums while covering Labor Insurance premiums was unique and had the potential to set a precedent within the insurance industry.

“What is to prevent other insurance corporations from demanding the same treatment?” she said. “If Tsai feels that National Health Insurance is a basic right, she should force National Health Insurance and Labor Insurance to be considered together.”

Nan Shan Life Insurance Co said the union was “mixing up fish eyes and pearls” in its call for National Health Insurance and Labor Insurance to be considered together, adding that it is in the process of applying for a ruling on the constitutionality of the Supreme Administrative Courts determination that insurance agents were formal employees.