ANZ admits misleading representations in credit card repayment insurance, FMA says

The FMA says ANZ had admitted making misleading representations in providing credit card repayment insurance to some customers

Personal Finance

The FMA says ANZ had admitted making misleading representations in providing credit card repayment insurance to some customers

12th Feb 21, 12:47pm by Gareth Vaughan

ANZ New Zealand, the country's biggest bank, has admitted making misleading representations in the provision of credit card repayment insurance to some customers, the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) says.

This, the FMA says, is in breach the Financial Markets Conduct Act with a hearing to determine the penalty held at the High Court at Auckland on Friday.

"The admissions were made as part of a resolution reached between the FMA and ANZ of proceedings that the FMA filed in June 2020. The FMA had alleged ANZ charged certain customers for credit card repayment insurance policies that offered no cover or benefit," the FMA says.

"The FMA claimed that ANZ breaches section 22 of the Financial Markets Conduct Act by making false and misleading representations about the cover conferred by certain policies. The FMA proceedings sought both a pecuniary penalty of $280,000 and declarations of contravention."

"These are the first civil proceedings the FMA has brought under the fair-dealing provisions in part 2 of the Financial Markets Conduct Act . The FMA is now awaiting the decision of the Court and will comment after it is issued," the FMA says.

An ANZ spokesman says the bank is awaiting the Court's decision and will comment after it's issued.

"We stopped selling credit card repayment insurance in 2019," the ANZ spokesman says.

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9 Comments

by lastredact | 12th Feb 21, 2:02pm 1613091751

Oh ANZ, don't you ever change

by Zack Brando | 12th Feb 21, 4:21pm 1613100101

by bw | 12th Feb 21, 2:49pm 1613094566

1.3 billion after tax profit last year, and a $280k slap on the wrist - 0.02% of their profits - is going to teach them much.

by Fritz | 12th Feb 21, 4:39pm 1613101196

Anz seem to be consistently naughty.

by skip- | 12th Feb 21, 11:16pm 1613124984

Nah, just caught being naughty. They’re all just as bad.

by pacifica | 12th Feb 21, 11:44pm 1613126682

Hanlon's razor it is not malice it is incompetence. Much like the other foibles and fumbles, (e.g. ANZ mistaking one database date field for another on kiwisaver funds losing thousands of investors thousands), it is a creaky system, sold by those who do not understand what they are selling and making massive profits mostly off housing speculation gains. The decisions they make are more by dumb luck than by evil intent. Even a cat picking stocks can beat fund managers over time and it is the control and position they have been given by the govt that makes ANZ the most money. Given billions of money to throw on the housing speculation pyre guaranteed by successive govts to always increase. What is disturbing is the fact they are doing so poorly with the profits they do get and cannot be bothered to update many of their systems to not fail so hard and so often. Hundreds of millions in profit and they cannot keep a few major branches down country open, they cannot train staff to understand the terms of what they are selling and they cannot train for and use better back end management & security. Even if ANZ was looking to support property development on the pointy end selling the buildings themselves close to cost they would still be making massive profits from land sales alone in this govt.

by Nifty1 | 13th Feb 21, 7:50am 1613155808

ANZ to use part of FLP savings to repay fraud penalties...nice

by nigelh | 13th Feb 21, 10:01am 1613163710

whose the chairman again?

by linklater01 | 13th Feb 21, 3:53pm 1613184811

The litany of banks shafting their customers and society at large is very long. The Dark Towers, a history of Deutsche Bank's appalling behaviour over many decades puts them high on the shame list but they have lots of competitors-Barclays, RBS, HBOS, HSBC and others.
Fines, however large, do nothing. Until senior execs believe that they could face jail time, nothing will change. Bank staff are incentivised to produce short-term profit and face no penalties when their high-risk strategies go wrong.