Chatswood serves the life and health insurance sector in New Zealand with market intelligence, data, and bespoke consulting services. Some of these are provided in conjunction with Quality Product Research Limited - a subsidiary that brings you Quotemonster.
We believe that good decisions are more likely to occur when we have good information about the market environment in which we operate. Intuitive leaps and creative decisions are always required, of course, but the more they are based on a firm foundation of observation, the better they tend to be.
Quality Product Research: Research Advisory Board – Northern
Last month we held our first Research Advisory Board meeting of the year and got lots of valuable feedback on items ranging from ratings for rural key person to proposed rating of disclosure.
Last month we held our first Research Advisory Board meeting of the year with our Northern Representatives and as usual returned to Quotemonster HQ with lots of valuable feedback.
Board members: Allan Gillbanks (Owner, Director of The Quantum Group) and Katrina Church (Director, Head of Client Engagement of Insurance People)
Independent Chair: Tony Dench
Insurer Observers: Laura Fitzpatrick (Asteron Life)
Research Team: Russell Hutchinson, Doreen Dutt, Sara Alani and Kim Oliver
The research advisory board reviewed the following topics:
Interim Cover: based on discussions, QPR will look to create some educational material on interim cover.
The Addition of Legacy Research to our Standard Quote Flow: for improved clarity, we’ll review renaming ‘Legacy products’ to ‘Closed products’ and look to include a workflow to help advisers handle legacy products.
Specific injury add-on compared to built-in for IP: we will review the value of Specific Injury as a built-in item vs a standalone item.
Finalised Rating for Rural Key Person: we announced the launch of rural key person cover ratings for five providers - AIA, Asteron Life, Fidelity Life, Chubb Life, and Partners Life. Based on discussions, we will review the rating differences for some specific features. We’ll also gather feedback on the weighting for home modifications and vocational rehabilitation to ensure the ratings accurately reflects their value.
The Proposed rating of disclosure: this is all about how easy it is to find policy documents on insurers’ websites and for customers to access all required documentation easily. We plan to review and rate this feature across all products in future.
The Proposed rating of Waiver of Premium: members liked the idea of splitting up the different types of premium waivers and having them as separate items (injury {traditional WOP}, parental leave, unemployment, and redundancy being the main 4 categories). Our research team will look to implement these changes in our database in the next few months.
Quote Functionality - Error Message / Exact Match vs Near Match: we’re looking into whether we’ll be able to implement near matches (rather than just exact matches) for products that are similar but not the same.
As always, the feedback from our Research Advisory Board meetings has been very valuable to our Research team and allows us to strengthen our research ratings by getting more insight into the adviser perspective. We look forward to meeting with our Central and Southern Advisory Boards later in the year.
nib research finds more adults are staying on top of essential health screenings
Recent nib research has found that more adults are staying on top of essential health screenings, but costs remain a barrier.
Recent nib research has found that more adults are staying on top of essential health screenings, but costs remain a barrier. The research was carried out in February 2025 and surveyed 1,010 Kiwi, building on the last survey conducted in December 2023. Some of the key findings include:
An increasing number of adults are keeping up with necessary health screenings - up to date with eye checks (45% up from 43%), dental check-ups (36% up from 35%), and heart health screenings (31% up from 28%).
30% believe their health is better than their peers, up from 25% in 2023.
Financial concerns are increasingly preventing Kiwi adults from accessing health checks, with 36% citing cost as a barrier (up from 29%).
80% of those with health insurance are committed to health screening checks (vs 72% overall).
More parents feel clear about which screening checks their children need (72% up from 58% in 2023).
More parents believe an annual health check is essential for their children (84% up from 75% in 2023).
More children are staying up to date with common screening tests - hearing checks (54% up from 48%), dental check-ups (66% up from 55%), eye checks (57% up from 50%) and general health exams (59% up from 57%).
Rob Hennin, Chief Executive Officer at nib New Zealand, said
“Proactive health screenings can be lifesaving and it’s really encouraging to see that Kiwi are taking the reins when it comes to their wellbeing. It’s clear to see that accessibility and cost issues continue to be barriers.”
More news:
Jason Gunn announced as new AIA Vitality Ambassador
Gallagher introduce new fundraising initiative, Gallagher Club Kickback
Partners Life go live with “no signature required” for majority of policy administration processes
mySolutions roadshows run across May in Hamilton, Wellington, Christchurch and Auckland
mySolutions webinar 'Exclusive Small Business Group Health' is on 23 April
Financial Advice NZ are holding an Ethics Workshop on 8 May
TAP webinar 'Ready to see TAP in action?' 8 May
Westpac launches a pilot for a basic transactional bank account
Fidelity Life celebrates its latest 20 Career connect graduates
Last week, Fidelity Life held a celebration to honour its latest 20 Career Connect graduates. Each graduate has successfully completed their Level 5 qualifications in life, disability, and health insurance.
Last week, Fidelity Life held a celebration to honour its latest 20 Career Connect graduates. Each graduate has successfully completed their Level 5 qualifications in life, disability, and health insurance.
Anna Devereux; Women in finance scholarship recipient (Dunedin)
Ashlee Cuttance (Dunedin)
Awhina Scott; Pounamu scholarship recipient (Christchurch)
Briar Evans (Auckland)
Caitlin Hayward (Morrinsville)
Christabel Bertie (Auckland)
Grace McIntyre; Rural scholarship recipient (Dunedin)
Harpreet Rehal (Auckland)
Jenny Silva; Kōwhai scholarship recipient (Queenstown)
Kim Forsythe (Invercargill)
Kirsty Gobbie (Auckland)
Leean Te (Auckland)
Marna Breetzke; Pāua scholarship recipient (Auckland)
Matthew Roxburgh (Dunedin)
Myja Gregory (Auckland)
Namrata Kumar (Auckland)
Shiwangni Mala (Auckland)
Sydnee Taylor; Toe Toe scholarship recipient (Christchurch)
Taylah Marr; Rāngi Po scholarship recipient (Christchurch)
Vanessa Jones-Dutton (New Plymouth)
This year, 95% of Career connect graduates were women, and a quarter of the group identifies as Māori or Pasifika.
Michelle Doyle, Head of Solutions said
"More than 60% of the graduates who asked for introductions to adviser businesses have already landed jobs, excited to start careers that help New Zealanders protect what matters most.”
Since its inception in 2023, Career connect has had more than 200 registrations for 70 course places, welcomed 47 students and helped almost 40 people gain their Level 5 qualifications in life, disability, and health insurance.
Submissions to be part of the 2025 intake of Career connect closed earlier this month with nearly 70 applications from a diverse group of candidates across various ages, genders, and cultural backgrounds.
More news:
Expressions of interest for Partners Life New Adviser Training Course open
mySolutions webinar 'Navigating the future ' 2 April
FSC webinar 'How financially resilient are Kiwis?' 29 April
Adviser refunds income protection premiums in FSCL dispute
Chubb Life appoints new CFO
Chubb Life has appointed Jaco Grobbelaar as its chief financial officer.
Chubb Life has appointed Jaco Grobbelaar as its chief financial officer. Grobbelaar has more than 25 years of experience in the insurance and financial services sectors. Grobbelaar was most recently at Partners Life, where he led the finance function team across a range of activities to help strengthen organisational resilience and growth.
Chubb Life chief executive Gail Costa said
"Jaco has a strong track record of optimising financial planning and reporting processes, driving efficiency and successfully leading teams through change. I'm really looking forward to having Jaco on board and have every confidence that his expertise, experience and leadership will further strengthen our senior leadership team."
More news:
mySolutions roadshow 'Persistence: it's your Superpower' in May
Fidelity Life publish February turnaround times
Partners Life webinar 'Quote for Alteration Changes' 3 April
nib delay launch of Ultimate Life & Living Insurance suite
Southern Cross Healthcare looking for a People and Culture Business Partner
The FMA is looking for a Head of Deposit Taking
Partners Life’s new training module ‘Fair Treatment of Customers’
Partners Life have introduced a new training module ‘Fair treatment of Customers’, to help advisers be better prepared for the new Conduct of Financial Institutions (CoFI) regulations coming into effect on 31 March.
Partners Life have introduced a new training module ‘Fair treatment of Customers’, to help advisers be better prepared for the new Conduct of Financial Institutions (CoFI) regulations coming into effect on 31 March. The module is worth approximately 0.5 hours of CPD and is available on the Partners Life Academy.
Partners Life developed two different new eLearn modules on the fair treatment of customers – one for staff and one for independent financial advisers. The staff version focuses on how the fair conduct principle applies to daily work and interactions with clients and advisers. The adviser version includes more information on the shared responsibility for customers that is held between Partners Life as the product provider and the adviser who has a deeper understanding of the client’s personal situation and financial circumstances. Partners Life appreciate that advisers are familiar with the new CoFI legislation, however, they wanted to share their expectations in a format that would be easy to read and included a short quiz to test their understanding.
By the end of March, a customer-friendly version of their fair conduct programme and information on how Partners Life apply the fair conduct principle will be available on their website.
More news:
Southern Cross Health Insurance funds pilot for access to The Prostate Clinic
Momentum Life offer customers 20% off online wills in partnership with Public Trust
FMA ad campaign educating consumers about Fair Conduct Programme to launch soon
Experts advocate raising KiwiSaver minimum contributions to 4% from both employees and employers
Product and pricing changes at Partners Life
Partners Life have announced a range of product changes, effective from 15 March 2025, aimed at giving customers more flexibility and the option to remove features if they don’t want to pay for them.
Partners Life have announced a range of product changes, effective from 15 March 2025, aimed at giving customers more flexibility and the option to remove features if they don’t want to pay for them.
The built-in Total and Permanent Disability (TPD) Benefit will become a TPD Option. If a client opts out of TPD, the premium for their monthly disability cover will reduce accordingly. This change applies to Mortgage Repayment Cover, Household Expenses Covers and Income Cover Agreed Value, Agreed Loss of Earnings and Indemnity Loss of Earnings.
They have made changes to Trauma Cover and Moderate Trauma Cover for clients who have suffered an out of hospital cardiac arrest. They have removed obsolete medical requirements, and added current diagnostic tools used by medical staff to confirm a cardiac arrest has occurred. The wording has been updated to allow for new and future diagnostic tools.
They have updated Trauma, Moderate Trauma and Severe Trauma Cover wordings to let clients know that Partners Life will notify them when they can exercise their Life Cover or Deferred Trauma Cover buy-back options.
Any beneficial enhancements to policy wordings are automatically applied to existing in-force policies under the Guaranteed Upgrade of Future Benefits feature.
In addition to the product changes, Partners Life have reviewed premiums, in light of increased volume and cost of medical claims. Premiums for Private Medical Cover including Specialists and Tests Option will increase by 18% and the policy fee will increase from $58.08 to $64.13 per annum, both from 22nd April 2025.
More news:
FSC25 Conference: Transforming for Tomorrow is on 10 - 11 September in Auckland
The Rising Stars in Insurance Seminar expands to more cities
Managing risks posed by Artificial Intelligence in the banking Sector
70% of NZ CEOs say AI has increased efficiencies in their employees’ time at work
What’s the biggest health claim paid for a procedure?
The health insurance industry has been experiencing a time of rising medical costs, where both volume of claims and inflation have been increasing. We’ve taken a closer look at individual claims values that a few insurers have released recently.
The health insurance industry has been experiencing a time of rising medical costs, where both volume of claims and inflation have been increasing. We’ve taken a closer look at individual claims values that a few insurers have released recently. As you can see from the data below, the costs of individual claims can be astronomical.
nib regularly publish their top 5 health claims by month. RiskinfoNZ has an article collating historical nib’s top health claims by month here.
nib’s top health claims for January 2025
Treatment Cost Gender Age
Spinal surgery $101,000 Male 16
Cardiac surgery $85,000 Male 46
Cardiac surgery $56,000 Male 70
Cardiac surgery $54,000 Female 70
Digestive surgery $53,000 Male 72
nib’s top health claims for December 2024
Treatment Cost Gender Age
Cardiac surgery $103,000 Male 72
Cancer surgery $102,000 Male 77
Cardiac surgery $93,000 Male 80
Cardiac surgery $88,000 Male 76
Spinal surgery $87,000 Male 48
But these do not top the charts of what we are currently aware. Southern Cross’s most expensive surgical claims were $256,165 for a spinal fusion procedure and $127,191 for a breast reconstruction.
While Partners Life don’t release a similar monthly overview of their top claims, their ‘The story behind our claims’ slideshow highlights their largest single payouts since 2011. The most expensive claims paid out were a whopping $1.6 million+ for Total and Permanent Disability or Income cover; $2.9million +for Life cover; $3.2million + for Trauma cover and $982,000+ for Private Medical Cover.
While the majority of claims won’t cost anywhere near as much, what used to be ample caps of some older medical values don’t seem so rosy in light of recent inflation and surging claims costs. Yet we haven’t seen any insurers coming out and indexing claims caps. We think that’s wrong, and we’ll offer a score boost to the first insurer who offers indexed caps.
What types of claims have you heard of and how did they go? We would love to hear more from you, especially if you are a Quotemonster subscriber, through our adviser claims experience tool (check the side menu when you are next logged in).
More news:
mySolutions webinar 'What got you here, won't get you there' 19 March
Steve Wright on potential implications of government’s plan to use private health care facilities for public health treatments
Good Returns has an interesting article by Steve Wright considering some of the implications of what may happen if the government goes ahead with their reported plan to consider using private health care facilities to reduce elective surgery waiting lists.
Good Returns has an interesting article by Steve Wright considering some of the implications of what may happen if the government goes ahead with their reported plan to consider using private health care facilities to reduce elective surgery waiting lists. Aside from the obvious benefits of kiwis on public health waiting lists potentially getting treated quicker, Wright considers some potential downsides, from reduced pressure to improve public sector capacity, to the private sector becoming overwhelmed or people ditching their health insurance and the private sectors viability coming into question.
We think these risks are low, given the scale of the intervention proposed by Minister Brown – just $50m to be spent between March and the end of June. For context, ACC will purchase around $500m in surgery in the 2023/24 year, and the total New Zealand Health budget is circa $16.6 billion. For an individual who gets a needed surgery a little faster, we are delighted, but this intervention is unlikely to make a big impact.
More news:
Partners Life new training module ‘Fair Treatment of Customers’
Fidelity Life offers drought-affected Taranaki customers premium relief
The FMA is on track to approve 77 licence applications under CoFI regime
Finance Minister Nicola Willis is reassessing the capital held by banks
Fidelity Life has made five new appointments to its Adviser council
Fidelity Life has made some changes to their Adviser council, adding five new members.
Fidelity Life has made some changes to their Adviser council. Last year when Fidelity Life announced they were looking for new council members, they were overwhelmed with responses. The five new members joining the Adviser council are:
Sarah Hunger, Managing Director and adviser – Cura Advisers Ltd
Andrea Reid, Director and adviser – Aliya Brokers Ltd
David Jochem, Director and adviser – Insure Ltd
Cory Bennett, Director and adviser – Float Financial Advisers
James Pearson, Head of Risk – Total Life Ltd
The departing members are:
Johny Winstone
Emma Hunter
Mark Breen
Yang Gu
Andrew Millar
The Adviser council was established to hear insightful and relevant feedback and respond with actions that drive better outcomes for Fidelity Life’s Adviser community and their customers. They meet quarterly to give objective feedback on new adviser and customer initiatives; collaborate to drive positive change for the industry; share and feedback on market and industry trends, opportunities and issues; and provide fresh insights, ideas and views.
More news:
Partners Life’s office is closed on 27 February 2025 as they hold an all-staff conference
nib to roll out life insurance offering next month
nib’s new Ultimate Life and Living products, which include life, trauma, TPD, income protection and mortgage protection will be available from next month.
nib’s new Ultimate Life and Living products, which include life, trauma, TPD, income protection and mortgage protection will be available from next month. nib are currently running roadshows outlining its new products, but pricing will not be released until closer to the policies being in the market. QPR has rated the products, and they have come out favourably.
New customers buying bundled health insurance and Ultimate Life and Living policies will qualify for a 10% premium discount, while current members can qualify for multi-cover discounts ranging from 10% – 15%.
More news:
Fidelity Life increasing the underlying premium rates from 1 April
Partners Life’s QFA Phase 2 upgrade is now live
Financial Advice NZ Community of Practice: Central District 25 February
Willis Towers Watson will carry out the first independent investment review of ACC