Zmiany struktury kanałów dystrybucji a poprawa warunków konkurencji w sektorze ubezpieczeń w Polsce w latach 2002-2009

.Integration with the European Union was a source of significant changes in the Polish insurance sector. The period of 2002-2009 was characterized with the increase of foreign capital investment and the increase of competition from domestic and foreign insurers. One of the more important consequences of that process was the broadening of the range of products and changing of the structure of distribution channels. The goal of the analysis is the examination of the directions and scale of changes in the structure of insurance products and the structure of distribution channels in the year 2002-2009. The research is based on the data on insurance companies from the Polish Financial Authorities (KNF) and the Polish Chamber of Insurance (PIU). The results indicate that with the increase of the foreign investments the insurance sector and the improvement of the economic situation of Poland, the significant increase of the market share of mid-sized insurance companies was recorded. At the same time the level of the sector concentration was lowered. Insurance companies changed the product structure, inter alia, by offering more life insurance as an investment vehicle for households’ savings and reducing the share of communication insurance and increasing financial and property insurance. Transformation of the insurance sector during the period of 2002-2009 was also associated with the restructure of the sales system and a significant increase of the sales in the bancassurance system. As a result insurers achieved sales diversification in the insurance sector in Poland. Additionally the distribution with Internet and telephone became a growing distribution channel.