CEA fears partial renewal of block exemption ruling will hiinder co-operation between insurers
The CEA, the European insurance and reinsurance federation, is concerned that the only partial renewal of the Insurance Block Exemption Regulation (BER), as adopted today by the EU College of Commissioners, will reduce cooperation between insurers, to the detriment of consumers.
The European Commission has decided to renew just two of the four areas in which certain cooperation agreements in the insurance sector are currently exempt from EU competition law. It has announced that it will issue guidelines for the other two areas.
“In contrast to the BER, the guidelines that will be issued for standard policy conditions (SPCs) and for security devices are not legally binding”, said Michaela Koller, CEA director general. “They will therefore not ensure legal certainty and the CEA is concerned that it could lead to a significant drop in cooperation.”
In the two renewed exemptions — insurance pools and joint compilations, tables and studies — the CEA is pleased that the Commission has recognised that the BER helps insurers to generate efficiencies through legitimate cooperation, to the benefit of consumers.
The CEA welcomes the clarification of the definition of new risks for pools, which now covers, for instance, agricultural risks and natural disasters, the nature of which is fundamentally changing as a result of climate change. It also includes risks arising from new technologies or new legal provisions.
However, the CEA points out that the new market-share calculation for pools leaves larger insurers outside the scope of the BER. Consequently, smaller insurers will not have the opportunity to cooperate with larger companies and benefit from their experience. Ultimately this may result in a lack of available cover for certain risks and less capacity in the market.
