Research finds EU insurance mediation streamlining has had mixed results
A new report commissioned by the City of London Corporation to analyse implementation of the EU Insurance Mediation Directive (IMD) will be launched at today’s Biba conference in London.
The report finds “gold-plating” the minimum requirements of the directive is common, for example;
- information requirements differ with some member states requiring the provision of risk-sheets, policy summaries and a fee disclosure by the intermediary
- views on competence vary widely, with the UK’s Financial Services Authority adopting a flexible approach compared to the other countries statutory regulators who require strict qualifications and requisite training hours
- gold-plating the IMD requirements to match previous statutory regulation e.g. minimum limits of professional indemnity cover in France.
The study has revealed that where a single regulator exists, such as in the UK and the Netherlands, ‘direct selling’ has been captured by the rules, in contrast to the approach of sector-specific regulators in France and Germany which originally focused on intermediaries.
Commenting on the findings, Michael Snyder, chairman of policy at the City of London, said: “It appears that the IMD is increasing cost and regulatory burden to the point where smaller operators could be driven from the market.”
