A pair of decisions from the General Insurance Council of the Alberta Insurance Council impose a civil penalty totalling $1,000 on Billyard Insurance Group Inc. and an identical sanction against its agent, Gurdip (Ronnie) Janjua, for transferring policies from one insurer to another without the informed consent of those clients and, in Janjua’s instance, transferring a client against their express wishes.
In the agency’s case, the council took note of the agency’s cooperation and commitment to adjusting their processes and the fact that it had proactively consulted the insurance council regarding how to proceed with portfolio transfers. The council ultimately decided to treat all 38 of the transferred policies in question as one offence.
A general insurance agency since February 2021, Billyard had its contract cancelled by one insurer and found only one willing to replace the business with acceptable terms. The agency’s book consisted of 748 policies. In its response to the insurance council, the agency outlined its new process for switching clients from one insurer to another, which the council ultimately took into consideration when deciding to sanction the agency for only one offence.
A high standard of due diligence is expected
In the council’s decision they say the evidence makes it clear that the agency automatically transferred policies from the former insurer to the proposed insurer without providing a comparison and without seeking direct informed consent from all clients involved. “It is not unreasonable to expect a high standard of due diligence, honesty and integrity be practiced by insurance intermediaries when making changes to their clients’’ insurance policies,” the decision states.
In Janjua’s case, meanwhile, the agent, licensed since May 2008, is being sanctioned for just one transfer that was made despite the client expressly stating that they weren’t interested in moving with the agent to the new insurance company. The client informed the agent, called again to restate their case, followed up the email with a phone call and still had their account debited by the new company without their consent.
“I wrote to Ronnie, but he became unprofessional and this led him to informing RK, another agent in his company, to cancel every product I had with the company,” the client states in correspondence with the insurance council. (An email between the agent and RK confirms this. “We are going to cancel all those,” Janjua writes.) Among the receipts provided, it is also notable that the agent once contacted the client by phone at 5:38 a.m. “to harass and intimidate me.”
On Janjua’s part, the agent claims to be regretful and embarrassed. He has reportedly completed professional conduct training. “In addition, I have met with our corporate team and we have reviewed action plans on how I can manage myself should a situation like this arise in the future,” he wrote to the council.
Although the insurance council could levy a penalty not exceeding $5,000 in the case, it took Janjua’s cooperation and previous discipline by the agency into consideration and ordered a penalty of just $1,000.
