Archive year 2011

A review of the Motor Accidents Authority (MAA) was released this week and some parties are not happy with the findings.

The NSW Parliamentary Law and Justice Standing Committee released its eleventh review into the MAA and the Motor Accidents Council (MAC) on Tuesday.  A copy of the report is no longer available.

Amongst other things, the report found that for the last five years there is a gap between the profit insurance companies project for the purpose of setting greenslip premiums and the profit they actually make.

The NSW Bar Association says that this represented a fundamental flaw in the greenslip scheme in NSW and, along with the NSW Greens, has called for an overhaul of the scheme.

The Insurance Council of Australia argues that the higher profits result from fewer claims on the scheme.

There is an interesting article in today’s The Daily Telegraph by Andrew Clennell, titled “Battle of $77 green slip lift”.  The article says that the State Government, through the Motor Accidents Authority (MAA), is pushing back on requests by insurers for increased CTP greenslip premiums.

Under the current legislation, the MAA may reject a premium proposed by an insurer if, in its opinion, the premium will not fund liabilities under the scheme, the premium is excessive or the premium does not comply with guidelines issued by the MAA.

If the MAA and the insurer are not able to reach agreement on the premium, the matter may be resolved by an arbitrator agreed on by the parties, or in the absence of agreement on an arbitrator, by the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART).

As at June 1998, there were 13 insurers licensed to issue greenslips in NSW. Today there are 7 licensed insurers.

The licensed insurers are AAMI, Allianz, CIC Allianz, GIO, NRMA, QBE & Zurich.

The 7 insurers are controlled by 5 companies. Suncorp owns GIO and AAMI. Allianz also owns CIC Allianz.

In the current debate about insurer profitability we need to keep sight of the fact that the State Government can not afford for any of the current insurers to withdraw from the scheme.

A reduction in the number of insurers, or companies which own them, could reduce competition, placing even greater pressure on greenslip prices.