FCA Business Interruption Test Case - the judgment

This comprehensive and interactive one-hour webinar will focus on the judgment following the FCA’s ground-breaking test case at the High Court. The hearing concluded on 30 July and the judgment was handed down on 15 September. Eight days were spent analysing key policy wordings and individual words and their everyday meanings and this is reflected in the judgment that runs to 162 pages.

Is the judgment clear? Well not entirely! Insurers who have over-interpreted their wordings (trying to establish the original intention) look like they are on the hook (pending an appeal) but some who have tighter wordings appear not to be so. The FCA consider some 370,000 insureds have had payments denied and this appears to be a conclusive win for them and the policyholders at the heart of this. This case will be momentous and will set clear precedent as to the clarity of wordings and what needs to happen to ensure future cover is clear and understood by all parties.

At the same time it will highlight the exposure for insurance brokers all of whom will have arranged these covers for clients (and some will be classed as co-manufacturers under PROD) and encourage them to robustly reassess their advice process under ICOBS and their overriding professional duty to clients thus ensuring their own professional indemnity costs remain reasonable.

Learning objectives - by the end of this webinar delegates will gain insights into:

• The Test Case and why brought;
• The judgment - what has been decided;
• The threat to brokers in terms of the advice process;
• ICOBS and how to ensure your sales process is robust.

It is relevant to general insurance brokers/intermediaries, their insurers, and any other market participants.

Speaker bio

Branko Bjelobaba FCII has worked for 32 years across the sector and latterly at PwC and GISC and has led his own consultancy practice for 16 years. He works closely with BIBA (and has published its compliance manual since 2004) and the CII and has provided many well-received (even entertaining!) training events throughout the UK. He is a recipient of the Thomson Reuters Compliance Personality of the Year Award and the London Market People Award for Legal and Compliance.