In July 2025, the Insurance Council of British Columbia (ICoBC) completed the development of a new competency framework to standardize general insurance licensing requirements in the province, making the framework public in August.
To enable the use of the competency framework for general insurance licensure, to define the range of fees that the council will charge to accredit courses from education providers and to better define what is covered in the province’s Council Rules Course, the council is publishing the related rule amendments for comment. Consultation on the proposed amendments is open until October 17, 2025.
Developed over six years with input from the industry
The competency framework, developed over six years with input from the industry, regulators and subject matter experts, establishes the standard for skills, knowledge and abilities required to obtain a general insurance license in British Columbia. It is anticipated that this standard will enable education providers to create curriculum for accreditation.
Under current rules in the province, an applicant for a general insurance license can meet their education requirements by completing approved courses offered by just two providers. Prior to opening up the market to new providers, the council says it wanted to have a shared understanding between the regulator, educators and the industry about the standard of skills and knowledge required for license qualification.
The insurance council already has an existing accreditation program for continuing education. “The forthcoming accreditation program for general insurance education is for pre-licensing education and is intended to support the use of the general insurance competency framework,” says Janet Sinclair, CEO of the Insurance Council of British Columbia.
She adds that the council remains on track to provide additional information about the accreditation program in the fall of 2025. New entrants to the profession and those switching between licensing levels, will need to meet the framework’s criteria and obtain the requisite education from accredited education providers by December 2026.
Education providers
Harjit Sihota, an Insurance Brokers Association Of British Columbia (IBABC) director and regional director of the InsureBC Group, a nominee herself at several agencies, says the lead time is sufficient, but says if there is any part of the proposal which requires reexamination, it would be the thought that the insurance council will be opening up the market to new education providers.
“It would be preferable if they only use the current education providers,” she says. Opening the floodgates to every organization offering soft skills training, she says will create bottlenecks for those working with and assigning education to their licensees.
“They should reexamine that for a later time,” she says, adding that the education industry too is undergoing changes, as well.
Standardization is welcome
“When I’m sending someone to take a course, I like to have somebody in my organization who’s already taken it. I want to know what that course is all about. If there are too many out there, it’s going to create bottlenecks more than anything.” She also notes that the new competency framework will make it such that agencies can’t simply appoint a nominee. “For a lot of the bigger brokerages, the nominee, it’s a huge role,” she says, but adds that the standardization is welcome, as currently the nominee’s role is currently somewhat subjective and generally defined by the firms employing them.
Other than that, she says the council has been very collaborative and receptive in their approach to developing the framework. “You left there being heard,” she says. “They actually made changes.”
With consultation on the enabling rule amendments closing on October 17, Janet Sinclair says the council expects to provide stakeholder feedback to the organization’s voting council at their December meeting. “Council will then decide if the draft amendments require any revision and if they are prepared to submit them for ministerial approval,” the CEO said in a statement to the Insurance Portal.
Labour mobility
One of the leading reasons for developing the framework put forward by council, is the prospect of better labour mobility between provinces for licensed individuals. Sinclair points out that competency frameworks are common among other regulated professions, including financial planning, while other countries have competency profiles for insurance professionals, as well.
“Ontario has a competency profile for entry-level exams in general insurance and Quebec has a framework for competency evaluation. The development of BC’s framework was informed by input from other Canadian insurance regulators, educators, industry and subject matter experts in this field,” Sinclair states.
Sihota also welcomes the framework for the transparency it provides when working on inter-jurisdictional alignment. “I really do hope this competency framework will make it easier. That would be amazing.” she says.
“Insurance regulators across Canada are very interested in working toward greater labour mobility and have been engaging collaboratively at a national level to make progress on this,” Sinclair adds. “The introduction of the General Insurance Competency Framework in BC helps us to have clarity about our own expectations for general insurance licensure so we can have informed conversations with our counterparts about how that could translate between jurisdictions.”
