Over 2014 Legal & General paid 97% of all claims on its group protection products totalling £264m to 4,156 UK families.

This represents a £26m increase on 2013 figure of £238m and is 21% of the £1.26bn paid by the group protection industry overall.

For group life policies the company paid £220m and 99.7% of 2014 claims received, up from 99.3% in 2013 and close to the GRiD industry average of 99.8%.

Over 96% of claims were paid within five working days of receiving all the information. Group critical illness claims paid increased from £7M and 79% in 2013 to £8.6M and 82% in 2014, slightly higher than GRiD’s industry average rate of 80%.

The benefits paid by Legal & General’s group income protection policies also increased; rising from £28.2m in 2013 to £35.4m and the proportion of claims paid by Legal and General remained high at 95%, compared with the GRiD average of 83%.

L&G said group income protection policies can also provide active intervention to help people return to work before their absence is long enough to become a claim. The group protection industry helped a total of 1,529 people get back to work within the deferred period during 2014; 28% were able to do so with Legal & General’s help.

Stuart Welch, group protection director at Legal & General, said: “We are very proud of these figures as they are evidence of our desire to help make life better for our customers when things take a turn for the worse. We are paying a higher proportion of group protection claims, paying group life claims faster and paying more in total benefit.

“It’s great that GRiD publishes information on the support that insurers provide to help people back to work earlier. Our group income protection proposition has included earlier and more proactive intervention for a few years now and it’s rewarding to see the positive impact that this has for our customers.”