Compliance will continue to be an important topic for the insurance industry in 2017, one expert has said.
The insurance industry, be it life or general insurance, remains firmly in the spotlight of the regulator and Sheila Baker, managing director of audit, compliance and education firm Gold Seal, gave her opinion on ASIC’s focus over the coming year.
“ASIC reported just recently that there is a big trend in new licenses and changes to licenses both for brokers and underwriting agencies,” Baker told Insurance Business.
“Also, there has been a number of cases of brokers not submitting financial reports and if I worked at ASIC, I’d be keeping a much closer eye out for that.”
She urged brokers to pay greater attention to submitting these reports, as in several instances not doing so has led to the unravelling of fraud or complex cases of non-compliance.
The financial planning and life insurance industry may have taken the brunt of criticism and ASIC attention over the previous year but the general insurance industry should keep compliance as a key business issue.
High profile cases throughout 2016 show that compliance can also be an issue in the broker and AR world and the industry needs to remain on top of compliance issues as a show of trust towards clients.
Compliance with financial regulations is not the only issue for brokers and business owners in 2017 as workplace relations laws come into sharper focus.
It has never been easier for an employee to take a complaint to Fair Work or a similar body and Baker stressed that brokers need to remain watchful of HR issues.
“Having a HR complaint may not threaten your license to operate but it can be just as disruptive and expensive for a small business to defend a claim,” Baker continued.
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