The company said last week that those individuals will receive an extra, unspecified bonus to their funds to take this into account. Those not benefiting will be the company's motor, household and other general insurance policyholders, 600,000 health and medical insurance members, unit trust and PEP investors.Others who will lose out are the 10,000-15,000 members whose policies nature between now and March next year, when voting takes place. Qualifying members will be given the right to buy an additional amount of shares at a preferential price. Based on estimates of a pounds 2bn payout to policyholders, this would mean a basic allocation about pounds 500 worth of shares each.Among policyholders qualifying for shares are those with life and term assurance cover, both with-profits and unit-linked policyholders, personal pensions and annuity holders. Norwich Union said last week that it intends to give each policyholder a basic allocation of shares, with an extra amount depending on the scale of a member's savings with the company. However, the flotation will involve giving policyholders a parcel of shares each and raising extra capital from the stock market. Experts believe the company will be worth between pounds 4bn and pounds 4.5bn, with members receiving about pounds 2bn in shares.

The insurer refused to give details of its plans, which it intends to unveil ahead of a ballot and meeting of members next Spring. As with the building societies, Norwich Union plans to sweeten the deal for policyholders by offering them shares in the company when it floats next year. The decision, taken after a year's review of the insurer's options, follows the rush by most large building societies, including the Halifax, Woolwich and Alliance & Leicester, to become banks. Norwich Union this week became the first of the UK's mutual insurance companies to announce plans to float on the Stock Exchange, entitling 2.9 million policyholders to a shares handout. InSkinParams = new Array(); InSkinParams['srv_SectionID'] = '124015'; InSkinParams['srv_Keywords'] = 'home'; InSkinParams['srv_Categories'] = ''; InSkinParams['srv_UseSAS'] = 'false'; InSkinParams['sas_PauseAdTag'] = ''; InSkinParams['plr_InSkinID'] = 'myPageSkin'; InSkinParams['plr_ContentID'] = 'myContent1'; InSkinParams['plr_ContentW'] = '975'; InSkinParams['plr_FrameTop'] = '90'; InSkinParams['plr_FrameSide'] = '130'; InSkinParams['plr_FrameBottom'] = '90'; InSkinParams['plr_TotalW'] = '900'; InSkinParams['plr_TotalH'] = '600'; InSkinParams['plr_ContentType'] = 'PAGE'; InSkinParams['plr_HideElementsByID'] = ''; InSkinParams['plr_HideElementsByClass'] = ''; InSkinParams['plr_ExpandableDetached'] = 'true'; InSkinParams['plr_NoSkinInSkinResize'] = 'true'; InSkinParams['plr_AssumeSkin'] = 'false'; function addEvent( obj, type, fn ) { var obj = ( obj.constructor === String ) ? document.getElementById( obj ) : obj; if ( obj.attachEvent ) { obj[ 'e' + type + fn ] = fn; obj[ type + fn ] = function(){ obj[ 'e' + type + fn ]( window.event ) }; obj.attachEvent( 'on' + type, obj[ type + fn ] ); } else obj.addEventListener( type, fn, false ); } if ((navigator.platform.indexOf("Mac") == -1) && (navigator.platform.indexOf("Linux") == -1)) { addEvent(window, 'load', function() { var adjustment = 0; InSkinParams['plr_ContentH'] = jQuery('#InSkinPageContainer_' + InSkinParams['plr_InSkinID']).height() + adjustment; if (screen.width >= 1235) { InSkinLoad.init(InSkinParams); } }); }.