The life insurance industry has always stood on one fundamental promise, protecting families during life’s most uncertain moments. Yet behind the policies, premiums, and financial planning lies a growing challenge that continues to impact millions of people across the country. Policy lapses have quietly become one of the industry’s biggest concerns, affecting not only insurance companies and advisors but also families who unknowingly lose the financial protection they once depended upon. At a time when financial security matters more than ever, the industry is searching for leaders who can balance business growth with genuine customer welfare while using technology to solve long-standing problems in a practical way.
Few professionals understand this landscape as deeply as Tarun Bahri. With more than 27 years of experience across banking and insurance, he has built a career around customer retention, service excellence, digital transformation, collections, and operational innovation. Over the years, he has worked with some of the most respected names in the financial sector, including Citibank, HDFC Bank, and ABN AMRO Bank, before taking on leadership roles at Max Life Insurance, where he headed critical functions such as Customer Retention, Customer Service, Quality, Service Excellence, and Innovation.
Today, as the Co-Founder and CEO of The Policy Exchange, Tarun is leading an effort to reshape how the insurance ecosystem responds to policy lapses and customer financial distress. His vision goes far beyond improving operational metrics for insurers. Through data-driven insights, technology-led engagement models, and innovative retention strategies, he is helping insurance companies move away from reactive loss management toward a more proactive and sustainable customer-first approach.
What makes his work particularly meaningful is the larger purpose behind it. Tarun believes life insurance should continue protecting families even during periods of financial hardship. Under his leadership, The Policy Exchange is building solutions that not only strengthen insurer profitability and persistency but also preserve financial dignity and protection for policyholders who may otherwise be forced to walk away from their coverage.
In an industry often defined by numbers and policies, Tarun is bringing a more human perspective to insurance. He sees retention not merely as a business objective, but as a responsibility toward the financial future of millions of families.
Reimagining Life Insurance Through Innovation and Inclusion
Every year, thousands of policyholders are forced to discontinue their life insurance plans due to financial constraints, often losing both their protection and a significant part of the value they have already built over the years. While this creates hardship for families, it also affects insurers and agents who depend on long-term policy continuity.
Recognizing this overlooked gap, Tarun and his team set out to create a solution that could transform the way life insurance policies are viewed in India. Under its parent company, Fairvalue Insuretech Pvt. Ltd., The Policy Exchange is building a new-age InsurTech platform that brings together policyholders, investors, insurers, and agents into a single ecosystem where every stakeholder benefits.
Backed by decades of collective experience in the BFSI sector, the company is working toward solving a problem that has existed in the industry for years but has rarely been addressed at scale.
Addressing a Deep-Rooted Industry Challenge
Life insurance is designed as a long-term commitment. Yet, many people who purchase policies are unable to predict the financial uncertainties that may arise later in life. Job losses, business setbacks, medical emergencies, or changing family priorities often make it difficult to continue paying premiums.
According to Tarun, this is where the real problem begins. When a policyholder decides to surrender or discontinue a policy midway, the consequences extend far beyond the individual customer. The policyholder loses insurance protection and receives a surrender value that is often far lower than the premiums already paid. Insurance companies face declining persistency ratios, which directly impact profitability. Insurance agents also lose their renewal commissions, affecting their long-term income.
The scale of this issue is massive. Tarun points out that nearly ₹2 lakh crore worth of policies are surrendered annually in India, while another ₹2 lakh crore worth remain lapsed. Together, this represents an estimated ₹4 lakh crore opportunity where policyholders need support, liquidity, and protection.
Creating a Platform for Pre-Owned Insurance Policies
The Policy Exchange has introduced a model that rethinks how life insurance policies can function in the financial ecosystem. Instead of allowing a financially distressed policyholder to completely exit the policy, the company enables the policy to be assigned to an investor through its digital platform. The investor pays the surrender value to the original policyholder and takes over future premium payments. In return, the investor receives the maturity benefits of the policy once the term concludes. This arrangement creates value on both sides.
The policyholder receives immediate liquidity while still retaining partial life coverage. The investor gains access to a secure investment instrument that offers comparatively attractive returns. Insurance companies retain policies on their books, and the original insurance agents continue earning renewal commissions. Tarun sees this is one of the rare solutions in financial services where every stakeholder walks away benefiting from the transaction.
How Investors Generate Returns
At first glance, the model appears unconventional, but the economics behind it are straightforward. Life insurance products are structured to encourage long-term commitment. In the initial years, the surrender value is usually much lower than the total premiums paid. This means that when an investor acquires a policy midway, the investment is effectively being made at a discounted value.
Tarun explains it through a simple example. Suppose a policy originally had a tenure of ten years, but the policyholder is unable to continue after paying premiums for three years. The investor now enters the policy with only seven years remaining while acquiring it at a lower effective cost. This shorter investment horizon, combined with discounted entry, improves the internal rate of return for the investor.
At the same time, he makes it clear that this is purely an investment product for investors. The insurance protection element remains tied to the original structure of the policy rather than becoming a fresh insurance cover for the investor.
Building Trust with Insurance Companies
Partnerships with insurance companies form a crucial part of The Policy Exchange’s growth strategy. Beyond facilitating policy assignments, the company also offers insurers comprehensive retention services. Insurance companies are constantly focused on reducing policy lapses and improving persistency, and Tarun’s experience in managing such functions for large insurers has helped position the company as a strategic partner rather than merely a transactional platform.
The Policy Exchange currently works with 14 insurance companies and is already in discussions with several more. Its approach combines operational support, technology-driven workflows, and retention-focused solutions that strengthen the insurer’s existing ecosystem. The company’s ability to create mutual value across the board has helped it gain traction in a traditionally cautious industry.
Technology at the Core of the Business
Despite operating in a highly regulated and relationship-driven sector, The Policy Exchange remains deeply technology-focused. Every process within the company has been digitized. From onboarding and verification to transaction execution, the entire workflow is handled digitally without physical paperwork. This technology-first infrastructure allows the company to scale efficiently while maintaining transparency and operational speed. Tarun trusts that technology and AI will continue to play a defining role in the company’s future expansion. The recent funding raised by the company is being directed heavily toward strengthening technology capabilities and building organizational scale.
As an InsurTech venture, the focus is not only on solving today’s problems but also on building a platform that can evolve with the future of financial services.
A Vision Focused on Scale and Awareness
Looking ahead, Tarun envisions building The Policy Exchange into a transformative force within India’s insurance ecosystem. His ambitions are rooted not just in business growth, but in addressing a long-standing industry challenge that continues to affect millions of policyholders across the country. One of the company’s immediate priorities is to create greater awareness around policy exchange and policy liquidity, concepts that are still relatively new to many consumers and investors in India. As the market gradually evolves and awareness increases, Tarun aims for the company to capture nearly 50 percent of this emerging space.
The scale of the vision reflects the magnitude of the opportunity. Over the next few years, the company is working toward achieving annual transaction volumes of nearly ₹40,000 crore. Backed by technology, digital infrastructure, and a rapidly expanding network within the insurance sector, The Policy Exchange is positioning itself to scale quickly while continuing to simplify and modernize the policy retention ecosystem.
At the centre of this growth story is a deeper purpose. Tarun strongly believes that financial hardships should not force families to lose the protection they once invested in. By improving liquidity in life insurance policies, the company hopes to strengthen insurance penetration in India while preserving long-term financial security for policyholders.
The larger idea behind the model is simple yet powerful. Insurance protection and investment value do not always need to remain tied together in the traditional way. Through its platform, The Policy Exchange is creating opportunities where financially distressed policyholders can access liquidity without completely giving up their life cover, while investors gain access to stable long-term investment opportunities.
In an industry that has traditionally operated through rigid structures and limited flexibility, the company is introducing a more practical, inclusive, and customer-sensitive approach. Through innovation, technology, and a strong understanding of customer realities, Tarun Bahri and his team are working toward reshaping the future of life insurance in India.
