Mar 2018 Issue No.254
2018/2019 Council Elections
The General Insurance Council (GIC) and Life
Insurance Council (LIC) are conducting elections for the next term. Results will be officially announced at the commencement of the new term on 30 April when the AGM is held.
Insurance Fraud Prevention Claims Database (DB)
We are pleased to report that Member Companies
are showing immense interest in the DB. Onboarding meetings are being held with individual insurers and more are scheduled for the weeks to come. When your company is ready to meet the Project Team to better understand the onboarding process, please contact us at 2238 7714 or 2531 1831.
The newly formed Provisional Executive Committee (PEC) will start reviewing the service agreement, Code of Practice, Onboarding Toolkit and operation manual to prepare for the launch of the DB later this year.
Direct Licensing Regime for Insurance Intermediaries
The Insurance Authority (IA) plans to launch
an e-por tal for the future administration of intermediaries registration – electronic licence applications, notification of changes by licenses, reporting of CPD and renewal of licence for intermediaries.
Two briefing sessions were held on 21 March 2018 with close to 200 representatives from 58 Members participating. A raft of valid questions and serious concerns over the new portal were raised. HKFI is supportive of any initiatives that are environmental friendly and help streamlining the administrative procedures. That said, we are also conscious of the practicality of the portal and whether it facilitates adoption by the endusers, i.e. appointing insurers and insurance intermediaries. As such, we are now collecting views from Members to ensure the portal is fit for purpose (Circular Ref: Mv021/18).
Policyholders’ Protection Scheme (PPS)
The GIC and LIC have set up respective Task Forces to look at the issues in greater depth. The LIC Task Force wrote to the IA and proposed postponing the legislative process for PPS as it would take time to suitably address the 1% levy cap issue and in view of the implementation of the Risk-based Capital Regime. We also registered the industry’s concerns about the proposed Custodian Trust Approach and asked IA to provide further explanations. The GIC Task Force, on the other hand, will ascertain members’ views on other outstanding issues including the accumulation of offshore risk, the definition of SME, etc
International Financial Reporting Standard 17 (IFRS 17) – Insurance Contracts
The current Task Force expanded its membership and formulated views for the Hong Kong Insurance
Implementation Support Group set up by the Hong Kong Institute of Certified Public Accountants. To facilitate better understanding and preparation of General Insurance Members (GIMs), we have invited PwC to conduct a briefing on IFRS 17 in Cantonese on 18 April 2018. GIMs, in particular those with limited actuarial resources, are strongly recommended to sign up for the session (Circular Ref: Mv022/18).