Chatswood serves the life and health insurance sector in New Zealand with market intelligence, data, and bespoke consulting services. Some of these are provided in conjunction with Quality Product Research Limited - a subsidiary that brings you Quotemonster.
We believe that good decisions are more likely to occur when we have good information about the market environment in which we operate. Intuitive leaps and creative decisions are always required, of course, but the more they are based on a firm foundation of observation, the better they tend to be.
New health / medical insurance price comparison database
The health / medical insurance premium comparison database is available for our institutional subscribers and is accessed in the usual ways. Changes in V118 include:
Updated nib rates effective 1/7/25 (including new policy fee of $7.70)
Updated Southern Cross rates effective 1/7/25
Updated Partners Life rates effective 22/7/25 (available in quote software now)
Reinstated the ‘Include Discount for Multiple Benefits’ option. If you check this box, nib prices will include the 10% discount that applies when Ultimate Life and Living benefits are added.
Swiss Re on emerging risk insights
Swiss Re’s SONAR 2025: New emerging risk insights report identifies new or changed risks that could impact on insurers today and in the future.
Swiss Re’s SONAR 2025: New emerging risk insights report identifies new or changed risks that could impact on insurers today and in the future. The report highlights a range of emerging risks, with those most relevant to the life and health insurance sector being: declining consumer trust in institutions and the insurance industry; elevated levels of excess mortality; aging populations; extreme heat events; fungi-adaptations; harm caused by plastics; new technologies in healthcare delivery; rising consumption of ultra-processed foods; workforce gaps and skillset shortages. It’s an interesting read - we’ve picked out some things we think are particularly relevant to the New Zealand market.
With aging populations, fewer and later family formations could lead to less events (such as the birth of a child) that typically spur life insurance purchases.
While NZ is not subject to such extremes of temperature as in other parts of the world, a recent study estimated that 500 children under five are hospitalised for heat-related reasons each year in NZ . Currently 14 heat-related deaths occur in Auckland’s over-65 population annually – with climate change increasing the number of days exceeding 25C, we can expect the number of people dying from heat-related deaths to increase correspondingly.
With fungi adapting to warmer temperatures and the overuse of fungicides leading to more multi-drug-resistant fungal pathogens, there could be an increase in fungal infections and limited medical treatment options for those with fungal infections.
The potential health effects from micro- and nano-plastics and their additives are still being studied, but there is growing research on the negative impacts of plastics on human health.
Swiss Re highlight that innovations like GLP-1 weight-loss medications and the increasing uptake of these drugs should help reduce mortality in the future. Semaglutide (Wegovy/Ozempic) was approved for weight-loss use in New Zealand by Medsafe last month, though it is not Pharmac-funded.
The increasing availability and variety of AI and virtual health services should lead to healthier populations over time, by enabling early detection and preventative interventions. Personalised health monitoring and nudges towards healthier behaviour (a la AIA’s vitality product) will potentially reduce claim frequencies and lead to longer healthspans. Conversely, the digitalisation of medical records and other previously private health information, comes with greater data security and privacy risks.
Research has shown associations between high consumption of ultra-processed foods and elevated health risks, including obesity, type-2 diabetes, depression, cardiovascular disease and cancer.
An aging workforce will contribute to labour and skillset shortages in the healthcare field, which could lead to delays in medical treatment, under-diagnosis and sub-standard levels of care – leading to an increase in morbidity and mortality. Healthcare worker shortages have been in the news regularly in NZ and The Royal NZ College of General Practitioner’s 2022 workforce survey found 64% of specialist GP’s were intending to retire by 2032.
More news:
Fidelity Life roll out this year’s annual product re-accreditation
Financial Advice NZ community of Practice: Central District 17 July
Scheme of Arrangement between Foundation Life and policyholders approved
Russell Hutchinson writes of how insurers could improve awareness
Australian advisers change fee structure, higher revenue and profit
‘Therapy’ chatbots lead to FTC complaint over unlicensed mental health advice
In the US, the Federal Trade Commission has received a complaint about Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots allegedly engaging in the ‘unlicensed practice of medicine’.
In the US, the Federal Trade Commission has received a complaint about Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots allegedly engaging in the ‘unlicensed practice of medicine’. A coalition of digital rights, consumer protection and mental health groups have submitted the complaint about Meta and Character.AI chatbots that purport to be mental health professionals. The complaint has also been submitted to Attorneys General and Mental Health Licensing Boards of all 50 states.
The complaint has two premises. First, that therapy bots had falsely claim to be licensed therapists with training, education, and experience - despite Meta and Character.AI’s terms of service, which claim to prohibit the use of Characters that purport to give advice in medical, legal, or otherwise regulated industries.
“In its complaint to the FTC, the Consumer Federation of America (CFA) found that even when it made a custom chatbot on Meta’s platform and specifically designed it to not be licensed to practice therapy, the chatbot still asserted that it was. “I'm licenced (sic) in NC and I'm working on being licensed in FL. It's my first year licensure so I'm still working on building up my caseload. I'm glad to hear that you could benefit from speaking to a therapist. What is it that you're going through?” a chatbot CFA tested said, despite being instructed in the creation stage to not say it was licensed. It also provided a fake license number when asked.”
And secondly, questions of confidentiality. Users have had millions of interactions with these bots, often divulging deeply personal circumstances, and the complaint asserts that confidentiality is repeatedly asserted. However, the companies' Terms of Use and Privacy Policies explicitly state interactions with the bot are not confidential, and that anything users input can be used for training and advertising purposes and sold to other companies.
More news:
Claire McArthur is moving to SHARE
Financial Advice NZ webinar 'CoFi Incentives Regulations- A FAP Perspective' 6 August
Financial Advice NZ 'Microbusiness Risk Management Course' 14 - 15 August
Financial Advice NZ session 'Wellington Women in Financial Advice' 24 July
Fidelity Life offers premium relief for severe weather-affected customers
Psilocybin being researched as treatment for clinical depression brain health and longevity
The Government announces the reestablishment of the Health New Zealand Board
Things that caught our attention this week
If you want hip surgery that’s quicker, easier to recover from, and you do not have to wait two years to get it, then you could go to India. Saving a heap of time and money seems like a good thing. In fact, it makes you wonder why we don’t send more people for this - as part of our national health system. After all, you could send half the people on the waiting list and not a single New Zealand-employed doctor, nurse, or surgeon, would be adversely affected. But thousands of New Zealanders would be able to get back out there. Which medical policies allow treatment overseas and on what terms? Subscribers to our research can find the details - log in to your Quotemonster account and if you have research added scroll down the menu till you find the item ‘Health benefit maximums’ and click on that.
The FMA has published a self-check guide to help you work out whether your conflicts of interest policy is up to scratch. It’s a good guide, Sometimes I think that the regulator has a very good, but very dry, sense of humour. For example, the form includes the statement “At a minimum your policy is likely to include…” which is above all the points in the guide. Clearly, it’s all got to be in there, and they couldn’t think of anything that would be optional. But seriously, once you have had a situation where conflicts of interest were undisclosed, you get to appreciate the value of a good policy. We’re using it to self-check our policy, and we don’t give any financial advice.
Sticking with the FMA, they have also released guidelines on the use of non-adviser staff in interactions with clients and the through the advice process. Reading between the lines you can tell that they have seen a rise in this activity. Even if you are a willing complier you can imagine how a member of staff could quickly begin to push the boundaries into advice out of a desire to be helpful to a client. Clarity on roles is essential. You can check out more via this link.
Westpac started selling a new product, Lifeprotect, online through a digital advice process, to its customers. The product is underwritten by Fidelity Life, of course, Goodreturns has an article at this link which covers it. Important to note that the process is only available to Westpac customers, so you’ll need to find someone with a Westpac account to take you through it. Or if you’re really keen and you don’t know anyone, you can ask me.
Oh yes, and that article on Westpac quotes JP Hale on AI and advice (he thinks it won’t replace advisers). I agree, but for different reasons to his. That’s a longer conversation - but on the subject of chatbots, that reminds me, Kelly O, has a great article on Chatbots pretending to be licensed therapists, which you will find posted here later today. I’ve recently seen an article on chatbots making other errors. It’s a big issue. As you know we are keen on using AI in this business. Some applications are easier to implement than others. We are currently investing a lot in building capacity in this area - and doing that in a way which doesn’t send precious data to unregulated data centres in jurisdictions where privacy protections are very low.
We are kind of addicted to stats in this office. Some that have come up recently are excellent and form part of our data for advice package that we make available to advisers serious about getting third-party data to support their advice process. The ones we have seen updated include: working age population, labour force studies, household economic survey, number of dwellings, number of households, net migration, visitor numbers and many more. We like to understand total market size, insurance acceptance across the market, and the potential unmet needs for cover. Anyone interested in these areas can contact us for a walk through the market model.
Website and research upgrades: what you need to know – website version v4.6.9 / QPR v16.8
Our updated version of the QPR database has been released and contains the following updates.
Our updated version of the QPR database has been released and contains the following updates:
Researchmonster updates:
- Asteron Life product enhancements to personal and business
Asteron Life has recently rolled out a series of enhancements across its Personal and Business Insurance products. These updates are now reflected in our research ratings.
One notable change is the addition of Guillain-Barré Syndrome to the list of covered conditions under Trauma Recovery with Early Trauma. To view this in Quotemonster, make sure you’ve selected Trauma Recovery with Early Trauma in your Product and Provider Settings.
Read more here: https://www.asteronlife.co.nz/insurance/product-enhancements
- AIA product enhancements to personal and business critical conditions
AIA has recently introduced enhancements to their AIA Living and ASB Critical Conditions products. These improvements are also passed back to existing AIA Living Critical Conditions and Sovereign TotalCare Max Living Assurance customers.
A significant update has been made to the Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest definition. The enhancement expands the accepted forms of evidence, making it easier for customers who have suffered a cardiac arrest to qualify for a claim. These updates are now reflected in our research ratings.
Another valuable enhancement has been made to AIA’s Optional Trauma Buyback which allows customers to reinstate both Life and Trauma covers within 60 days of their claim being paid – while still retaining the option to reinstate at the 12-month anniversary if they choose not to act immediately. Following a discussion with our Central Research Advisory Board, we’ve redesigned the functionality and research of both Trauma and Instant Buybacks. These updates are due to go live in the coming weeks.
Read more here: https://www.aia.co.nz/en/help-support/enhancements-and-policy-information.html
It's great to see insurers continuing to innovate – and as always, we're right there with them, evolving our research to support smarter advice.
Training sessions:
Our team hosts online training sessions on a regular basis and invites you and your colleagues to join us if you’re interested in learning more about our services.
Our next sessions will be:
Introduction to Quotemonster – Monday, 21 July 2025 11:00 am-12:00 pm
In this session, we will demonstrate the basic functions of our website, along with some handy tips and tricks along the way.
Demystifying Advicemonster - Wednesday, 23 July 2025 9:30 am-10:30 am
In this session, we will demonstrate how to use our needs analysis and statement of advice (SOA) tools.
Business Risk Research and SOAs with Quotemonster – Thursday, 24 July 2025 9:00 am-9:45 am
In this session, we will demonstrate how to use our business risk pricing, research, and SOA functionality.
Introduction to Kiwimonster - Tuesday, 22 July 2025 10:30 am-10:50 am
A session on our brand spanking new service – Kiwimonster.
QPR Research Deep Dive - Tuesday, 22 July 2025 10:00 am-11:00 am
A deep-dive session designed for advisers seeking in-depth knowledge across a range of research topics.
If you would like to join any of these sessions, please email your request to info@quotemonster.co.nz
Happy Crunching!
Legal and regulatory update for the life and health insurance sector
Commerce Commission Chair reappointed and Associate Member cross-appointment renewed; FMA seeks litigation funding boost; FMA hold series of FAP forums; FMA confirm terms of reference on review of access to financial advice; FMA case study leads to reminder that only advisers meeting competency requirements are permitted to give advice.
4 Jul 2025 - Dr John Small has been reappointed as Chair of the Commerce Commission. Associate member Stephen Ridgeway’s cross-appointment to the Commission has been renewed. https://www.mbie.govt.nz/about/news/commerce-commission-chair-reappointed
6 July 2025 - The FMA is requesting a litigation funding boost from MBIE, with forecast litigation expenditure for 2025/26 expected to exceed the annual litigation funding appropriation of $5 million. https://investmentnews.co.nz/investment-news/fma-pleads-with-mbie-for-more-legal-aid/
8 July 2025 - The FMA is holding a series of Financial Advice Provider forums. https://www.eventbrite.com/cc/fap-forum-series-4328483
8 July 2025 - The FMA has confirmed the terms of reference that they first published in April on their review of access to financial advice. https://www.fma.govt.nz/business/focus-areas/consultation/review-of-access-to-financial-advice-for-nz-proposed-terms-of-reference/
8 July 2025 - In a FMA case study, the FMA observed a small Class 2 financial advice provider using client relationship managers in the advice process for insurance conversations, where the relationship manager – who is not an adviser – completed the majority of the advice process steps. The FMA reminds advisers that only those meeting the competency requirements set out in the Code of Professional Conduct for Financial Advice Services are permitted to give regulated financial advice. https://financialmarketsauthority.cmail19.com/t/r-e-thkhtull-udkykjihyu-s/
Quote error messages - what they mean and how to use them
Find out how to resolve quote errors.
This video will take you through how to resolve the most common error messages on your quotes.
nib NZ completes company amalgamation
nib NZ has successfully amalgamated its two operating entities into a single company, nib nz limited.
nib NZ has successfully amalgamated its two operating entities, nib nz limited and nib nz insurance limited, into a single company, now operating as nib nz limited.
nib NZ Chief Executive Officer Rob Hennin said
“By bringing our health, life and living insurance businesses together, we’re making it easier for members to engage with us and access the support they need. Importantly, this change does not affect members’ existing insurance cover, benefits or terms and conditions. For most, the only visible difference will be the name of the insurer on policy documents, renewal certificates and bank statements.
More news:
mySolutions webinar 'Kevin Smee- presents a Business Case Study' 9 July
FSC announce Dress of Success as charity partner for FSC25 Conference: Transforming for Tomorrow
Financial Advice NZ 'Professional Ethics Workshop' 31 July
Jon-Paul Hale believes AI doesn't have the nuance required for individual situations
Financial hardship withdrawals from KiwiSaver reach record highs
Legal and regulatory update for the life and health insurance sector
FMA & RBNZ release Statement of Performance Expectations; RBNZ announce appointments to its governing Board; ACC announce series of adjustments to client payments.
1 Jul 2025 - The FMA has published its Statement of Performance Expectations for 2025/26. https://www.fma.govt.nz/news/all-releases/media-releases/statement-of-performance-expectations-for-2025-26/
1 Jul 2025 - The RBNZ has appointed Grant Spencer and reappointed Byron Pepper to its governing Board. Mr Spencer will serve for a five-year term, from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2030. Mr Pepper will serve for a five-year term from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2030. https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/hub/news/2025/07/appointments-to-reserve-bank-board
1 Jul 2025 - The Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) has confirmed a series of annual adjustments to client payments, with new rates taking effect from July 1. https://www.insurancebusinessmag.com/nz/news/life-insurance/acc-boosts-payments-as-injury-costs-hit-new-highs-541105.aspx
2 Jul 2025 - The RBNZ has released its Statement of Performance Expectations for 2025/26, outlining what it intends to achieve to enable economic wellbeing and prosperity for all New Zealanders and how it will measure its performance. https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/hub/news/2025/07/rbnz-releases-statement-of-performance-expectations
Recent rate changes on Quotemonster
We are pleased to confirm that the following rate changes are live on Quotemonster effective 1 July 2025.
Dear Quotemonster users,
We are pleased to confirm that the following rate changes are live on Quotemonster effective 1 July 2025.
nib Ultimate Health and Ultimate Health Max
Southern Cross Wellbeing 1 and 2
If you have any questions or comments on these changes please reach out to us on info@quotemonster.co.nz
Happy Crunching!
