There has been a “sharp increase” in the dispute lodgement ratios for individual advised life insurance products since June 2021, according to APRA’s latest statistics.
APRA’s Life insurance Claims and Disputes Statistics publication, covering 1 July 2022 to 30 June 2023, presents the key industry-level claims and disputes outcomes for 17 Australian life insurers writing direct business.
APRA explains that the dispute lodgement ratio is defined as the number of disputes lodged per 100,000 lives insured.
The regulator also notes the dispute lodgement ratios for DII and Funeral have “…increased considerably over time, due to recent regulatory focus.”
Another area APRA highlights is original decision reversed by channels, for the year ended June 2018 to June 2023 noting “…the original decision reversed rates across all distribution channels have been trending downwards since December 2021.”
It says the original decision reversed rate “…is defined as the number of disputes with original decision reversed as a percentage of the number of disputes lodged in the same period.”
When looking at original decision reversed by cover types, APRA states that rates across all cover types have also been trending downwards since December 2021.
