Insurer data upgrade
International financial reporting standards are created by international standard-setting boards. IFRS 17 is designed to enable better understanding of insurer’s exposure, profitability and financial position and to facilitate comparison across similar insurance companies. Updates to financial standards are infrequent — the new standard replaces IFRS 4, which came into effect from 1 January 2005.
The New Zealand standard, NZ IFRS 17, went into mandatory effect for insurers from the start of the financial year, commencing on or after 1 January 2023. We issued the Interim Solvency Standard 2023 on 20 September 2022 and it is consistent with NZ IFRS 17. It went into mandatory effect for insurers from the date specified in each insurer’s modified licence conditions (intended to be the same date as the start of NZ IFRS 17).
Current QIR and AIR templates and definitions
On 12 May 2023, we finalised and published the new templates and definitions for Annual Insurer Report (AIR) and Quarterly Insurer Report (QIR). The templates and definitions will be updated from time to time. Each material change will have a new version number and we will specify the applicable version for each report date. It is the insurer’s responsibility to download and use the appropriate template version for each set of reporting to the Reserve Bank. Immaterial changes (for example, changes to the list of insurer names) will keep the same version number but will have a new release number.
The current version is version 1.5 which was published on 13 June 2024.
The updated versions must be used for report dates on or after 30 June 2024.
The changes made in version 1.5 are:
- Updated definitions in Section 2.5 insurance service expense to clarify the NZ IFRS 17 references.
- ‘Solvency RNBZ’ sheet – fix bug for consolidated insurance risk charges, additional calculations for catastrophe risk charge to ensure the summary tax table is correct, added instructions for various risk charges that values (of assets and liabilities) are limited to those applicable to the risk charge and may differ from financial statement values, added calculation of target capital expressed as a target solvency margin.
- ‘Validation check’ sheet – added validations for submission instructions checklist.
- ‘Sign-off’ sheet – added instruction that return sign-off is not an Annual Certification or Interim Certification.
- Some minor changes to support RBNZ processing.
The version of QIR and AIR templates and definitions required to be used depends on report date and balance date, as follows:
| Report dates | Balance dates | Version of AIR & QIR | Version of definitions |
| 30-Jun-24 to present | All | 1.5 AIR (XLSX, 6 MB) QIR (XLSX, 4.4 MB) |
1.5 (PDF, 307 KB) |
| 01-Sep-23 to 29-Jun-24 | All | 1.4 AIR (XLSX, 6 MB) QIR (XLSX, 4.3 MB) |
1.4 (PDF, 306 KB) |
| 01-Jul-23 to 31-Aug-23 | 31-May, 30-Jun, 31-Aug, 30-Sep |
1.4 AIR (XLSX, 6 MB) QIR (XLSX, 4.3 MB) |
1.4 (PDF, 306 KB) |
| 01-Jul-23 to 31-Aug-23 | 31-Dec, 20-Feb, 31-Mar | 1.3 AIR (XLSX, 5.3 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.8 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
| 01-May-23 to 30-Jun-23 | 31-May, 30-Jun, 31-Aug, 30-Sep | 1.4 AIR (XLSX, 6 MB) QIR (XLSX, 4.3 MB) |
1.4 (PDF, 306 KB) |
| 01-May-23 to 30-Jun-23 | 31-Mar | 1.3 AIR (XLSX, 5.3 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.8 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
| 01-May-23 to 30-Jun-23 | 31-Dec, 20-Feb |
1.2 AIR (XLSX, 5.1 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.7 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
| 31-Mar-23 to 30-Apr-23 | 31-Mar, 31-May, 30-Jun, 31-Aug, 30-Sep | 1.3 AIR (XLSX, 5.3 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.8 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
| 31-Mar-23 to 30-Apr-23 | 31-Dec, 20-Feb | 1.2 AIR (XLSX, 5.1 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.7 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
| 31-Dec-22 to 30-Mar-23 | All | 1.2 AIR (XLSX, 5.1 MB) QIR (XLSX, 3.7 MB) |
1.0 (PDF, 664 KB) |
Not all balance dates will have reporting for all report dates due to the phased implementation of reporting under QIR and AIR.
Questions
If you identify errors in the templates and definitions or have any questions, please email [email protected] and copy your insurance supervisor.