Of the three major elements in the formulae for office premiums, mortality has been subjected to refined investigation; interest has been considered closely, particularly since the war; expenses alone have hardly been considered. We have found only four papers on the subject in the whole of J.I.A., three (19, 153; 44, 415; 49, 111) many years ago, and the fourth (69, 50) before the war. There have been a few papers since in T.S.A., notably Mr Pedoe's (4, 485).

Our object is to analyse the expenses of a group of British life offices, so as to provide a reliable basis for comparison of offices, to enable managements to test the efficiencies of their own offices against others, and to provide means for getting standard costs as a tool of administration.