Insurers are always looking for ways to evaluate and predict thelifestyle risks of potential or current clients. Motor vehiclerecords, or MVRs, could become the next popular predictive datasource for calculating an individual's all-cause mortality.A study by LexisNexis and RGA Reinsurance Co.analyzed more than 7.4 million MVRs and found that persons withserious and frequent violations had much higher all-cause mortalitythan those with clean records or a few minor infractions.

LexisNexis and RGA Reinsurance Co. cross-referenced the MVRswith the Social Security Death Master File and used the informationto run an actuarial mortality study. This allowed the companies tocalculate relative mortality ratios for specific customer segments.Three major groups were distinguished: clean records, minorviolators, and major violators (pre-defined as alcohol or substancerelated infractions, excess speeding and reckless driving in orderto avoid bias).

The results included the following observations:

• Trends are consistent among age groups but are more pronouncedfor women
• The more violations an individual has on his or her MVR,regardless of severity, the higher the relative mortalityratio
• Having a major violation raised one's all-cause mortality by 71percent; having six or more violations resulted in 79 percenthigher mortality ratios
• Mortality of individuals with four or more MVR violations ismore than double that of individuals without major violations.

Motor vehicle records could surpass current popular methods forrisk prediction—social networking, online shopping and subscriptiondata—because of reliability, affordability and ease of use. Byexamining an applicant's MVR, life insurers can make more accuratepricing decisions, improve applicant retention and minimizeunderwriter reporting.