An insurance sales agent swindled a huge amount of commissions from Axa Life Insurance Co. and other life insurers via fraudulent sales of policies to corporate customers, sources said Friday.
Shinwa Sogo Lease, which went bankrupt in December, fraudulently received in transactions since 2006 several billion yen in commissions from Axa Life, a Japanese unit of Axa SA, France's largest insurer, and at least ¥1.9 billion from Mitsui Sumitomo Kirameki Life Insurance Co. in 2004 alone, they said.
Shinwa had worked for other insurers as well, so the total amount it may have swindled from insurers may be much larger, the sources said.
Shinwa had tax accountants introduce managers of small and midsize corporations, who would buy policies to insure against the deaths of employees, the sources said.
In exchange for paying premiums on behalf of such firms, Shinwa used their names as buyers of policies from the insurers for which it was working as an agent.
While receiving sales agent commissions from the insurers, it canceled the policies within a short period and received cancellation returns.