MORTGAGE LOANS - Troubled Debt Restructuring (Details) - Commercial mortgage loans $ in Thousands	9 Months Ended	12 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2018 USD ($) contract	Dec. 31, 2017 USD ($) contract
Financing Receivable, Modifications [Line Items]
Number of Contracts \| contract	1	1
Pre-Modification Outstanding Recorded Investment	$ 2,694	$ 418
Post-Modification Outstanding Recorded Investment	$ 1,748	$ 418

Line items represent financial concepts included in a table. These concepts are used to disclose reportable information associated with domain members defined in one or many axes to the table.

No definition available.

+ Details

Name:	us-gaap_FinancingReceivableModificationsLineItems
Namespace Prefix:	us-gaap_
Data Type:	xbrli:stringItemType
Balance Type:	na
Period Type:	duration

- Definition

Number of financing receivables that have been modified by troubled debt restructurings.

+ References

Reference 1: http://fasb.org/us-gaap/role/ref/legacyRef
-Publisher FASB
-Name Accounting Standards Codification
-Topic 310
-SubTopic 10
-Section 50
-Paragraph 33
-URI http://asc.fasb.org/extlink&oid=84173941&loc=SL6953676-111524

+ Details

Name:	us-gaap_FinancingReceivableModificationsNumberOfContracts2
Namespace Prefix:	us-gaap_
Data Type:	xbrli:integerItemType
Balance Type:	na
Period Type:	duration

- Definition

Post-modification amount of investment in financing receivables modified by troubled debt restructurings.

+ References

+ Details

Name:	us-gaap_FinancingReceivableModificationsPostModificationRecordedInvestment2
Namespace Prefix:	us-gaap_
Data Type:	xbrli:monetaryItemType
Balance Type:	debit
Period Type:	duration

- Definition

Pre-modification amount of investment in financing receivables modified by troubled debt restructurings.

+ References

+ Details

Name:	us-gaap_FinancingReceivableModificationsPreModificationRecordedInvestment2
Namespace Prefix:	us-gaap_
Data Type:	xbrli:monetaryItemType
Balance Type:	debit
Period Type:	duration

- Details

Name:	us-gaap_AccountsNotesLoansAndFinancingReceivableByReceivableTypeAxis=plico_CommercialMortgageLoanMember
Namespace Prefix:
Data Type:	na
Balance Type:
Period Type: