Legal and regulatory update for the life and health insurance sector
21 Nov 2023 - The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has released its Quarterly Superannuation Performance publication and the Quarterly MySuper Statistics report for the September 2023 quarter. https://www.apra.gov.au/news-and-publications/apra-releases-superannuation-statistics-for-september-2023
21 Nov 2023 - The Financial Services Council has today released its initial report outlining the challenge to update the permitted operating model for defined benefit (DB) workplace savings schemes by enabling them to consolidate, thereby benefiting both members and employer sponsors through improved cost-effectiveness and simpler administration. https://blog.fsc.org.nz/media-release-21-november-2023
22 Nov 2023 - The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority has released its quarterly private health insurance (PHI) publication for the September 2023 quarter. https://www.apra.gov.au/news-and-publications/apra-releases-quarterly-private-health-insurance-statistics-for-september-5
22 Nov 2023 - The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has released a response to consultation on its proposed amendments to three private health insurance (PHI) reporting standards, following amendments to PHI legislation. https://www.apra.gov.au/news-and-publications/apra-responds-to-consultation-on-amendments-to-private-health-insurance
23 Nov 2023 - The Privacy Commissioner has announced that his Office will be consulting on new rules specifically for biometrics. Biometrics are increasingly collected by facial recognition technology (FRT), retinal scans, and voice recognition. The exposure draft will be released early in 2024 and will be available for everyone to comment on. https://privacy.org.nz/publications/statements-media-releases/privacy-commissioner-to-consult-on-new-rules-for-biometrics/
24 Nov 2023 - FMA released its Audit Quality Monitoring Report for 2022/23 https://www.fma.govt.nz/library/reports-and-papers/audit-quality-review-report/
27 Nov 2023 - Medical Assurance Society (MAS) are to pay a $2.1 million penalty for making false and misleading representations to customers, following proceedings brought by the FMA. In September 2023, MAS admitted it breached section 22, one of the Fair Dealing provisions of the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 (FMCA), by failing to correctly apply multi-policy discounts and no claims bonus discounts to some customers who were entitled to them, failing to correctly apply inflation adjustments on some customer policies, and miscalculating benefit payments. https://www.fma.govt.nz/news/all-releases/media-releases/medical-assurance-society-to-pay-2-1-million-penalty/
27 Nov 2023 - The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has released for consultation a new cross-industry standard to centralise APRA's existing standards on definitions for authorised deposit-taking institutions and general, life and private health insurers. https://www.apra.gov.au/news-and-publications/apra-consults-on-new-cross-industry-standard-to-centralise-existing-standards