Despite meaningful improvement by some insurers, it remains a lottery for anyone unfortunate enough to need family violence support from their insurer.

This was the key finding of an updated desktop audit of the family violence policies of 55 subscribers to the General Insurance Code of Practice. The purpose of the updated audit was to identify whether subscribers had acted to improve their written policies in the intervening two years since the benchmarking 2021 audit which found that general insurers had a lot of work to do to lift standards in line with expectations.

The audit found that 11 general insurers updated and improved their family violence policies since 2021. However, 29 insurers (almost two thirds) failed to act to improve their policies and 1 insurer updated their policy and moved backwards.

“While we warmly welcome the improvements identified in our audit – especially Nib and RACQ who improved their policies significantly – we remain disappointed that the general insurance sector more broadly has failed to take more action and lift their game when supporting people experiencing family violence and financial abuse,” said Financial Rights Chief Executive Officer Karen Cox. “Our reports findings are far from a ringing endorsement of voluntary, aspirational guidelines and their ability to motivate improvements in consumer protections.”

The updated desktop audit also identified 8 new general insurer code subscribers, with 5 of these introducing family violence policies and 3 newly identified subscribers’ family violence policies unable to be located.

“These findings mean that a consumer experiencing family violence may find themselves seeking help from an insurer who has a minimal policy, or even no family violence policy at all. This is no longer acceptable in 2024.”

“The sector is currently reviewing its Code of Practice and we urge insurers to commit to including the key elements of the Family Violence Guide in the Code itself to ensure that all policies meet minimum standards.”

Other highlights of the updated desktop audit include:

• 3 of Australia’s biggest insurers: Suncorp, Allianz and IAG that have now included a ‘conduct of others’ clauses in their product disclosure statements.
• 10 additional insurers have added quick exit buttons to enable a safer browsing experience for consumers experiencing family violence.
• 2 subscribers (Catholic and Eric) have closed or are in run off and no longer have family policies available, even though they continue to serve existing customers who may need to call upon a family violence policy.

“Despite the important improvements identified in this audit - the report’s overall findings should be a wake-up call to a sector that is falling behind community expectations at a time when urgent action is needed.”

“It seems that if we are to wait for general insurers to all voluntarily achieve best practice, then we may have to wait a very long time. And while we wait, some of the most vulnerable consumers in Australia pay the price.”

The full desktop audit can be obtained on the Financial Rights publications page.

Background

The 2020 General Insurance Code of Practice (the General Insurance Code) introduced a requirement for insurers to have family violence policies available online for their customers. For many insurers, this will be the first publicly available written policy indicating how they will support customers experiencing family violence.

In 2021 the Financial Rights Legal Centre (Financial Rights) saw this as an important opportunity to inquire into which insurers’ written policies demonstrated best practice, and to benchmark all General Insurance Code subscribers to encourage continual improvements to their family violence policies.

This resulted in the report Family Violence and General Insurance: Updated Desktop audit of family violence policies, August 2021. Only one general insurer’s family violence policy, AssetInsure, achieved top marks for a policy that included both definitive language and specific measures, and detailed how they would help those subject to family violence.

Disappointingly, a little over half the subscribers scored 5.5 out of 11 or less, meaning that their policies did not even meet half the expectations outlined by the Insurance Council of Australia.

In November 2023, the Insurance Council of Australia announced an independent review of the 2020 General Insurance Code of Practice. Financial Rights once again saw this as an opportunity to investigate whether insurer subscribers had acted to improve their written policies in the intervening two years since the previous benchmarking report was released. We wanted to see whether the aspirational nature of the Family Violence Guide had resulted in tangible improvements to insurers’ family violence policies.

Contact

For further information contact Drew MacRae media@financialrights.org.au or 0404 604 978

About Financial Rights

Financial Rights is a community legal centre that specialises in helping consumers understand and enforce their financial rights, especially low income and otherwise marginalised or vulnerable consumers. We provide free and independent financial counselling, legal advice and representation to individuals about a broad range of financial issues. Financial Rights operates the National Debt Helpline, which helps NSW consumers experiencing financial difficulties. We also operate the Mob Strong Debt Help services which assist Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples with credit, debt and insurance matters.