Related to its 2021 continuing education (CE) audit conducted in October 2021, the Alberta Insurance Council continues to levy sanctions against agents who failed to respond to demands for information when the council sought to verify that the CE credits declared by agents on their licensing applications were correct.

Auditees were selected at random and asked to provide proof of their CE credits. In all cases the council emailed the demand for information, followed up with two more reminder emails and a phone call, and sent a final reminder email before the information was required.

In the first case, Jason Ince, a general insurance level 1 agent since 2016, requested an explanation as to why his certificate of authority was suspended before then providing the required information. “The agent did respond, but it was outside of the period set out in the demand,” the decision states. Ince was fined $750. 

In a second case, new agent Aditya Deosthale, licensed from March until November 2021 as a general insurance level 1 agent, was fined $1,000 when he failed to respond to the regulator altogether. “The agent has not responded in any meaningful way and the council believes that a significant penalty must be assessed to send a strong message to not only the agent, but to all licensees,” they write. 

Earlier this month, Insurance Portal reported on other fines levied by the Alberta council for CE reporting violations.