The Insurance Authority (IA) has imposed a 14-year ban on a former insurance agent of Prudential Hong Kong Limited due to his misappropriation of premiums from four policyholders. Over a period of two years, the agent instructed the policyholders to transfer premium payments into his personal bank account instead of paying Prudential directly. As a result, the policyholders paid him a total of RMB 2,346,237, but he only forwarded RMB 87,151 to the company. Consequently, ten insurance policies lapsed due to non-payment, unbeknownst to the policyholders.
Although the agent has returned RMB 657,073 to Prudential, resulting in the reinstatement of five lapsed insurance policies, he permanently deprived the policyholders of the remaining balance of RMB 1,602,013. The IA has urged Prudential to contact the policyholders affected by the remaining five policies to provide assistance or compensation. The agent’s misconduct was further exacerbated by his attempts to conceal his misappropriation, including delaying the provision of login details to one policyholder, which would have enabled her to directly verify the status of her policies through Prudential’s online portal. The agent’s false claim of relying on an alleged cousin as an assistant, without being able to provide any evidence of their existence, was seen as an attempt to shift responsibility and disguise his own serious misappropriations.
The IA’s Disciplinary Panel, limited by the self-regulatory rules in place at the time, unanimously decided to impose a 14-year ban on the agent as a strong deterrent and to send a message of intolerance towards such misconduct. The Panel highlighted the need to address such behavior firmly to protect the reputation of the insurance industry. The IA emphasizes that if the current regulatory regime had applied, it would have had the authority to impose a lifetime ban for such serious misconduct. The IA also mentions that it will refer such cases to law enforcement bodies as per its established network Memorandum of Understanding. This case serves as a clear warning of the IA’s commitment to punishing acts of misconduct that could tarnish the insurance industry’s reputation.
Resources: https://www.ia.org.hk/en/infocenter/press_releases/20240520.html
