The aim of this paper is to examine and document a scientific approach to establishing an estimate of the economic value or range of possible economic values of a life assurance enterprise.

This is essentially a practical paper which provides a ‘practitioner's guide’ to performing an actuarial appraisal of a life assurance company rather than providing a rigorous theoretical derivation of the methods. There is, however, a philosophical issue, that of an appropriate risk rate of return, which cannot be completely side-stepped in a paper on appraisal values. This issue is briefly covered in Section 3. It should be noted, however, that an entire paper could be devoted to this subject.

The paper finishes on a potentially controversial note, that of UK Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (UK GAAP) for life assurance companies, suggesting that the appraisal value techniques outlined in this paper could play a major part in formulating UK GAAP.