{"id":1249,"date":"2019-10-16T14:55:21","date_gmt":"2019-10-16T14:55:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.icsr.co.uk\/?p=1249"},"modified":"2019-10-16T15:54:07","modified_gmt":"2019-10-16T15:54:07","slug":"are-you-walking-into-a-price-problem-general-insurance-pricing-and-the-fca-remedies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.icsr.co.uk\/are-you-walking-into-a-price-problem-general-insurance-pricing-and-the-fca-remedies\/","title":{"rendered":"Are you walking into a price problem? General Insurance Pricing and the FCA Remedies"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In the fourth quarter of last year a Supercomplaint was raised by Citizens Advice with the Competition and Markets Authority raising issues in relation to a number of products offered within the Financial Services industry primarily in relation to pricing differentials between new and existing customers. For insurance this primarily focussed on motor and household insurance and the potential impact on vulnerable customers. However no-one should be surprised that the issues covered have a much wider application to other insurance products and customers.<\/p>\n

The timing was interesting as the FCA was just overseeing the introduction of the new rules on Product Governance and the Best Interests rule both brought about by the commencement of the application of the EU\u2019s Insurance Distribution Directive in the UK and the rest of Europe. These new rules required product manufacturers, whether they be insurers or intermediaries such as brokers or MGAs, to have in place detailed and effective methods for governing the development and oversight of their insurance products. The Best Interests rule requires all insurance distributors (again insurers or intermediaries be they brokers or MGAs) to act in the best interests of their customers, a significant change in regulatory tools and approach and a considerable extension of what was known as the Treating Customers Fairly principle which subsequently morphed into the FCA\u2019s approach to Conduct Risk.<\/p>\n

The FCA had already done some diagnostic work in the areas covered by the Supercomplaint and consequently their response was rapid and detailed. Because of the importance of all of these changes and the Supercomplaint, these are subjects we have already covered extensively, looking not only at the introduction of the new Product Governance requirements and Best Interests rule under the IDD but also the potential issues and impact of the Supercomplaint tying these together in an interwoven series of articles which can be accessed here:<\/p>\n