Underwriting is the process used by the insurance company to review any new application for coverage. This is a term used for all types of insurance, including health insurance, life insurance, auto insurance, homeowner's insurance and others. Whenever you apply for insurance, you are required to complete an application that will include many questions that will be used by the insurance company to analyze your risk-factor and determine if they want to accept you as an insured member for the type of insurance for which you are applying. Underwriting involves measuring risk eposure and determining the premium that needs to be charged to insure that risk. The function of the insurance underwriter is to only accept new plan members that will make the insurance company money and to protect the insurance company from risks that likely result in a loss. Each insurance company has a unique set of underwriting guidelines, but there are many similarities based on industry standards. In the health insurance industry, the underwriting process often requires that applicant provide health history and status. This is referred to as medical underwriting when the insurance company reviews the medical history of the applicant. The underwriters, during the underwriting process, may decide to make a counter offer to the applicant to balance the risk factor to the insurance company. This could include requesting a higher premium or placing eclusions on specific medical conditions. In the medical insurance underwriting process, the level of scrutiny is influenced by the type of health insurance and the laws of each state that govern the product type. For eample, a short-term health insurance policy will involve less underwriting because the insurance company is not concerned about the long-term risk of insuring the applicant. Small Small Business may require less underwriting because many states prohibit the insurance companies from declining the group application for medical reasons. In this case, underwriting is used to calculate premiums, view minimum participation guidelines and determine group eligibility. Insurance applications for lesser risk insurance policies, such as short-term health insurance and travel health insurance can be done through an automated program that can instantly approve or decline an applicant based on how they answer a series of questions. This automated underwriting process is commonly used for instant online applications and approvals, which save the insurance company time and money.