Insurance Authority Replaced Office of the Commissioner of Insurance

To line up with global practice that financial regulators ought to be monetarily and operationally free of the Government, the Insurance Authority (IA) has substituted the Office of the Commissioner of Insurance (OCI), an administration office, to direct insurance companies with impact from 26 June 2017 with Mr John Leung Chi-yan being the Chief Executive Officer of the IA for one year from 26 June 2017 to 25 June 2018. The OCI was disbanded around the same time.

The three self-regulatory organizations (SROs), i.e. Insurance Agents Registration Board built up under the Hong Kong Federation of Insurers, the Hong Kong Confederation of Insurance Brokers and the Professional Insurance Brokers Association will keep on regulating the insurance intermediaries meanwhile, enabling time for the IA to set up the essential instruments, for example, such as guidelines on conduct, for regulating insurance intermediaries.

The IA is anticipated to execute the new statutory licensing administration and to assume control over the regulation of insurance intermediaries from the three SROs inside the two years from 26 June 2017.

IA is entrusted to assemble another, autonomous, more encompassing and successful regulatory administration to encourage the sustainable improvement of the industry and to better ensure the interests of policyholders.

For more information concerning the “Insurance Authority Replaced Office of the Commissioner of Insurance”, please feel free to contact our Hong Kong team at + 852 2654 8800 or email us at info@opkofinance.com