Life insurers shifted their focus to selling high-value policies in October as the transition to new surrender value norms, effective October 1, limited their ability to roll out all products in their portfolio.This led to a 40 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) drop in the number of policies sold in October.Additionally, distributors engaged in a fire sale of policies in September due to uncertainty about the impact of the new norms on their commission structures.