Response to submissions - Enhancements to APRA’s quarterly insurance publication suite

The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) is releasing its response to submissions on proposed enhancements to the content and presentation of its suite of quarterly industry aggregate insurance statistical publications. The initial consultation was released on 23 April 2024.

Background

APRA has made significant changes to its capital and reporting framework for insurance with effect from 1 July 2023. These changes reflect the implementation of Australian Accounting Standards Board 17 Insurance Contracts (AASB 17), and revisions to the capital framework for private health insurers.

These changes have had an impact on the data presented in the quarterly insurance publications, which are based on now superseded reporting standards. APRA needs to revise the data presented in the impacted quarterly insurance publications to reflect the new reporting framework. APRA’s approach has been to ensure that, where possible, the enhanced quarterly insurance publications will provide the same level of data transparency as the existing publication suite.

APRA is also taking the opportunity to enhance how it presents data to its stakeholders, moving to a dynamic data visualisation approach featuring data tables and charts. This modernises APRA’s publication approach, which has traditionally focussed on static data tables, facilitating better alignment to stakeholder needs. 

In the discussion paper released on 23 April 2024, APRA sought feedback on the proposed content and presentation of the:

• Quarterly general insurance performance statistics
• Quarterly life insurance performance statistics; and
• Quarterly private health insurance statistics.

Submissions received

APRA received 12 submissions from insurers, industry bodies, and other interested parties, 7 of which were non-confidential. 

Submissions were broadly supportive of proposed changes to the content of the quarterly industry aggregate insurance publications. Additionally, submissions largely supported the release of interactive visualisations alongside flat file datasets to cater to a variety of end users.

Response to submissions 

Summarised below are the key themes raised across the submissions, along with APRA’s response. 

Data confidentiality

A number of submissions raised concerns around APRA publishing confidential data in its publications.

APRA has strict procedures and processes in place to safeguard the release of confidential data across all its public releases, including statistical publications. 

APRA intends to consult at a later date, on the confidentiality of data collected under the new insurance reporting standards. Until data collected under the new reporting standards have been determined non-confidential, APRA will apply the necessary protections to its insurance publications.

Other insurance publications

Some submissions sought understanding on the status of APRA’s other insurance publications, including the institutional-level publications.

APRA intends to consult with industry in phased stages and in further depth in the future, around changes to APRA’s other insurance publications. Appendix A contains a complete list of the insurance publications that will be consulted on.

Requests for additional data

Several submissions encouraged inclusion of various data items in the quarterly insurance publications in addition to what was proposed in the consultation paper.

APRA has considered this feedback. In the interests of supporting users’ needs and improved data transparency, APRA intends to include select data items in addition to what was originally proposed. These changes have been highlighted within the specifications in Appendix B.

Interpretation of data in the publications

APRA would like to emphasise that data presented in the quarterly insurance publications is being updated to reflect the new reporting framework for insurance with effect from 1 July 2023. 

Accordingly, users of the publications should interpret the data together with the latest APRA reporting standards and new AASB 17 accounting standards. 

The data in the revised insurance publications cannot be used as a direct comparison against the previous (now archived) versions of the quarterly insurance publications, which are based on the now superseded reporting and accounting standards. 

PHI publication suite

Submissions sought clarity on the content of the PHI publications in the new / revised publication suite. In particular, submissions sought clarity over the continuation of the membership and benefits summary statistics that were previously included in the Quarterly private health insurance statistics publication.

APRA has moved the existing membership and benefits summary statistics into a stand-alone publication Quarterly private health insurance statistics, to ensure that this data remains available to stakeholders. For the June 2024 reference period, this publication will be renamed to the Quarterly private health insurance membership and benefits summary statistics to reflect the revised content of the publication.

As outlined in the consultation paper, all financial and capital data will be published in the Quarterly private health insurance performance statistics, while the remaining seven granular publications remain unchanged. This is summarised in the table below.

Next steps

APRA intends to release the first edition of the enhanced quarterly insurance statistics in August 2024. This will include data for the September 2023, December 2023 and March 2024 reporting periods.

Appendix A

Appendix B