Brokers who place business through NZI or manage client portfolios underwritten by IAG’s retail brands face potential claims and servicing disruption after Workers First Union members began a 24-hour strike at the insurer’s Auckland and Christchurch offices on Tuesday.
IAG employs 3,699 people in New Zealand and insures roughly one in two households nationally, according to its FY26 annual report filed with the NZX. Across its New Zealand brands, the company processed more than 500,000 claims and paid out more than NZ$2.24 billion in the year to June 2026.
NZI was named a 2026 5-Star Claims honouree by Insurance Business, based on broker ratings across service consistency and claims management. A prolonged dispute could test that track record.
The walkout follows more than 18 months of collective bargaining that has not produced a new agreement. The workers’ collective agreement expired on March 31, 2025.
Pickets were held from noon to 2pm at 1 Fanshawe Street in Auckland and 14 Show Place in Christchurch, according to Scoop.
The two parties met with the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) in an attempt to resolve the impasse. According to Workers First, the union accepted the ERA’s recommendation, but IAG rejected it four weeks later. The content of that recommendation has not been disclosed.
Workers First said it is willing to drop all other outstanding claims if IAG withdraws two proposals the union describes as “clawbacks” of existing conditions.
Read more: IAG New Zealand profit falls as commercial GWP declines for NZI
The most prominent clawback is IAG’s push to introduce a 90-day trial period for new employees. The Employment Relations (Trial Periods) Amendment Act 2023, which took effect in December 2023, extended 90-day trial clauses to all employers. Under these provisions, new hires dismissed within the trial window cannot raise a personal grievance.
A separate Employment Relations Amendment Act that came into force in February 2026 removed the requirement for new non-union employees to be employed on collective agreement terms for their first 30 days. Law firm Duncan Cotterill, which analysed the change, noted that employers can now negotiate individual terms – including 90-day trial periods – from the outset, even where a collective agreement exists. Duncan Cotterill also noted that trial periods are likely to continue being strictly interpreted by the courts.
Callum Francis, national organiser for finance at New Zealand-based Workers First, said “the company is desperately clinging to its right to sack people without consequences.”
Francis said a 90-day trial “means a new colleague can be dismissed with no reason given and no way to challenge it.”
The New Zealand Alliance Party has publicly supported the striking workers. New Zealand Alliance Party Leader Victor Billot said IAG is seeking the ability to dismiss new workers without justification.
“This is exactly why we need a new government and new laws that will protect the working-class majority from arbitrary abuses of power,” Billot said.
Read more: New Zealand general insurance market in extended soft phase
The dispute sits within a wider pattern of workforce dissatisfaction across insurance in Australia and New Zealand. An Insurance Business survey published in July 2026 found that 46.10% of employees at top insurance employers said they were not consulted on benefits or working conditions in the past 12 months, up from 38.95% in 2024.
The same survey found 37.50% of respondents would change employers for better working conditions, the highest figure in three years of data.
KPMG data cited in the survey showed wage growth in financial and insurance services reached 2.5% through September 2025, the weakest of all tracked sectors.
IAG reported gross written premium of NZ$4,060 million for the year ended June 30, 2026. NZI saw commercial and personal lines GWP fall 11% in local currency during the same period.
For brokers, that combination of a softening intermediated market and an unresolved workforce dispute raises questions about whether claims turnaround and policy servicing could come under pressure heading into the summer storm season.
IAG was contacted for comment but had not responded at the time of publication.
