Financial Markets Conduct (Conduct of Financial Institutions – Veterinary Professional Insurance Society Incorporated) Exemption Notice 2025

The Financial Markets Conduct (Conduct of Financial Institutions — Veterinary Professional Insurance Society Incorporated) Exemption Notice 2025 (Notice) exempts Veterinary Professional Insurance Society Incorporated (VPIS) from the requirements under the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 (as amended by the Financial Markets (Conduct of Financial Institutions) Amendment Act 2022) (the Act) to:

1. be licensed as a financial institution; and
2. establish, implement, maintain, and comply with an effective fair conduct programme.

The Notice comes into force on 31 March 2025. 

The exemptions are subject to conditions that:

1. prevent VPIS from entering into any consumer insurance contracts, or any contracts that provide for life or health insurance (or both);
2. prevent VPIS from providing regulated financial advice to any current or prospective policyholders of VPIS insurance (VPIS Policyholders) except through Arthur J. Gallagher & Co (NZ) Limited as an interposed person; and
3. require VPIS to ensure that VPIS Policyholders that are retail clients receive information about the exemptions, as well as information about VPIS’s complaints process, including how to make a complaint.

The key reasons for granting the exemptions (as set out in full in the Statement of Reasons in the Notice) are:

• where VPIS is subject to subpart 6A of Part 6 of the Act only because it is providing a financial advice service to retail clients (being small businesses), and only in respect of non-consumer insurance contracts with those businesses, the costs of being licensed and complying with fair conduct programme obligations under that subpart are likely to outweigh the benefits for those retail clients;
• fair treatment and the interests of VPIS Policyholders are adequately addressed by the protections under the financial advice regime and the use of a licensed financial advice provider as an interposed person, and conditions require that this arrangement be maintained;
• the conditions also require VPIS to ensure VPIS Policyholders that are retail clients receive information about the nature of the exemptions, as well as information about VPIS’s complaints process, thus enabling them to make informed decisions;
• as such, the FMA is satisfied that the exemptions are desirable to promote the confident and informed participation of businesses and consumers in the financial markets, to promote and facilitate the development of fair, efficient and transparent financial markets and to avoid unnecessary compliance costs; and
• the FMA is also satisfied that the exemptions are not broader than reasonably necessary, in view of the limited nature of the exemptions that only apply to the extent that VPIS is providing a financial advice service that is a retail service.

Financial Markets Conduct (Conduct of Financial Institutions – Veterinary Professional Insurance Society Incorporated) Exemption Notice 2025 [PDF 362KB]