For 14 cents, a Shanghai company will compensate a driver for getting a parking ticket. Another one offers “love insurance” for $14. These are just 2 of the numerous offbeat insurance policies Chinese can buy to protect against risks as varied as unforeseen shipping bills and foul weather. The regulator is however clamping down.
OKChexian’s Mr. Qi has had a hand in developing some of the industry’s quirkier products, including parking and traffic-jam insurance, plus full-moon policies. The north China native says that after earning a master’s degree in actuarial sciences at Boston University, he spent five years at Plymouth Rock Assurance Corp. and saw how U.S. auto insurers were looking at ways to gather “telematics” data on customer driving habits—like his app does. “If there is a big market for this emerging in the U.S., there is a bigger future for this technology in China,” he said.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/need-love-insurance-china-is-your-place-1484130617