AIA New Zealand paid $790.3 million in claims in the year ended December 31, 2025, down 4.7% from $829.6 million in 2024, while its claims acceptance rate declined one percentage point to 91%. The figures, released in AIA NZ’s 2025 claims reporting, follow a higher claims year in 2024 and come as insurers continue to face pressure from rising healthcare costs, claims sustainability challenges, and evolving disclosure requirements under New Zealand’s insurance reforms.
AIA NZ’s total claims paid in 2025 declined 4.7% from the previous year, with the insurer reporting $790.3 million in claims for the year ended December 31, 2025, compared with $829.6 million in 2024. The 2024 total was itself a $95 million increase on 2023, with AIA NZ attributing the higher claims across life, health, and trauma products largely to rising living, mortgage, and healthcare costs, as well as inflation-linked increases in cover levels triggered by life events such as purchasing a home or having a child. The 2025 decrease therefore reflects a partial normalisation from an atypically elevated year rather than a reduction in claim volumes alone. However, AIA NZ also reported growth in high-value medical claims in 2025, including claims related to chemotherapy and complex spinal procedures.
The full product breakdown for 2025 shows $257.73 million in life insurance claims, $177.31 million in health insurance claims, $142.45 million in trauma claims, $108.69 million in income protection claims, and $21.35 million in total permanent disablement claims. While total claims paid declined year-on-year, income protection remained a significant component of AIA NZ’s claims experience, accounting for more than $108 million in payments during the year.
AIA NZ’s public claims reporting does not provide a breakdown of the reasons behind the 9% of claims not accepted in 2025. Common reasons claims may not proceed across the life insurance sector include policy exclusions, claims falling outside policy terms, or issues relating to disclosure at application, although AIA NZ has not provided a product-level breakdown for its declined claims.
Non-disclosure – currently the most consequential of those grounds – is the subject of incoming legislation that brokers should be tracking now. The Contracts of Insurance Act 2024 was passed into law on November 15, 2024, and takes effect on November 15, 2027. Under the Act, insurers will be required to ask consumers the right questions when processing new policies, rather than leaving it to consumers to know what to tell their insurer. The Act reforms disclosure obligations by moving away from broad requirements, instead requiring consumers to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation – an approach intended to provide greater clarity and ensure insurance markets operate fairly.
For brokers, this reform reconfigures the application process. The statutory obligation to surface relevant health history shifts further toward the insurer’s questioning framework, but advisers who facilitate that process remain professionally accountable for the quality of information captured. A client whose claim is declined for non-disclosure – under either the current or incoming law – represents a material failure point in the adviser relationship.
The sector-wide complaints picture reinforces why this matters. The Insurance & Financial Services Ombudsman Scheme (IFSO Scheme) accepted 600 disputes for investigation in the year to June 30, 2025, a 25% increase from the prior year, with 29% of those disputes relating to health, life, or disability insurance.
AIA NZ’s 2025 claims data highlights the continued significance of income protection within the insurer’s claims portfolio. A MoneyHub analysis of income protection claims from one of New Zealand’s largest independent insurance advisers for the 12 months to December 2025 found mental health conditions represented 32% of all income protection claims, compared with an estimated industry benchmark of around 20%.
AIA NZ’s 2024 data provides the insurer-specific baseline: the company paid over $25.7 million in mental health-related claims that year, with mental health accounting for 25% of income protection claims and 14% of total permanent disablement claims. More than $17.7 million of those payments went to customers aged 40 to 59. For brokers, the concentration in the 40-to-59 band – where income protection policies typically carry the largest benefit amounts – makes benefit period length, agreed versus indemnity structure, and rehabilitation provisions material considerations at policy design stage, not just at claim time.
Financial Services Council (FSC) data shows four million life insurance covers in force against an estimated population of 5.35 million as of March 31, 2026, with annual premiums reaching $3.31 billion, up 2.7% year-on-year, even as cover numbers continued to fall across several key products. The FSC has noted this may indicate pressure on household budgets, and that rising premiums can lead people to reduce or cancel cover – making regular policy reviews important.
AIA Vitality membership grew to more than 78,000 in 2025, up from approximately 55,000 in 2023. This represents growth of around 42% over two years, although Vitality membership remains a minority of AIA NZ’s overall customer base. AIA NZ CEO Nick Stanhope said 2025 delivered progress across sustainability priorities, including the completion of its refurbished Auckland headquarters, AIA House, which the company says reduces emissions by approximately 70% and cuts its physical footprint by 41%. “While there is more to do, we are proud of the progress we’ve made and the momentum we are building as we continue embedding sustainability across our operations and decision-making,” Stanhope said.
