Insurance Act 1966 · 2020 Revised Edition · Part 2 · Conduct of Insurance Business
23. Control of form of proposals, policies and brochures
Feedback & supportLast amended by an amending law of 2013.
The Authority may, by written notice, require a Singapore insurer to submit to it —
the forms of proposal and policy for the time being in use by the insurer in Singapore; and
any brochure which is for the time being in use by the insurer for describing the terms or conditions of, or the benefits to be or likely to be derived from, policies.
Where the whole or part of any such form or brochure required under subsection (1) is not in English, there must be submitted with it a translation in English.
Unless it is otherwise provided, a requirement under this section applies to all such forms and brochures coming into use after the making of the requirement and before the Authority notifies the insurer that the requirement is withdrawn.
If it appears to the Authority, after affording the insurer an opportunity to make representations orally or in writing, that any such form or brochure —
contravenes any of the provisions of this Act; or
is in any respect likely to mislead,the Authority may, by written notice, direct the insurer to discontinue the use of the form or brochure in Singapore either immediately or from a date specified in the notice.
A Singapore insurer must not use, in the course of carrying on insurance business in Singapore, a form of proposal which does not have prominently displayed therein a warning that if a proposer does not fully and faithfully give the facts as the proposer knows them or ought to know them, the proposer may receive nothing from the policy.
Singapore insurer
“Singapore insurer” means a person who is or has been carrying on insurance business in Singapore.(6) A person is not to be treated as carrying on insurance business, or any class of insurance business, in Singapore if, apart from the collection or receipt of premiums in Singapore, the person —(a)carries out all activities in relation to the person’s reinsurance business outside Singapore; and(b)does not have any commercial or physical presence in Singapore for the purpose of carrying on such reinsurance business.(7) The operation, otherwise than for profit, of a scheme or arrangement relating to service in particular offices or employments, and having for its object or one of its objects to make provision in respect of persons serving therein against future retirement or partial retirement, or against future termination of service through death or disability, or against similar matters, is not to be treated for the purposes of this Act as carrying on the business of insurance.(8) For the purposes of this Act, no society registered under the Societies Act 1966 or organisation registered under the Mutual Benefit Organisations Act 1960 is deemed to be an insurer, and no agent for such a society or organisation is as such deemed to be an insurance agent; nor do references in this Act to a policy or contract of insurance apply to any policy or contract whereby an insurance is effected with such a society or organisation.(9) For the purposes of this Act —(a)any reference to the last statutory balance sheet or to the last statutory valuation is to be construed as referring to that last prepared or made and not superseded by the arrival of the date as at which another is to be prepared or made; and(b)any reference to there being shown in a statutory balance sheet or on a statutory valuation a surplus of assets over liabilities of an insurance fund is to be construed accordingly by reference to the form of balance sheet or valuation balance sheet as the Authority may prescribe or specify in directions, and to the rules to be followed under this Act and any such directions in preparing it.(10) The definitions set out in the First Schedule have effect for the construction of references in this Act to policies of insurance, policy owners and policy moneys.[2 For the purposes of this Act, insurance business is divided into 2 classes —(a)life business, which means all insurance business concerned with life policies, long-term accident and health policies, or both; and(b)general business, that is to say, all insurance business which is not life business, including the effecting and carrying out by any person, not being a person licensed, approved, designated or otherwise regulated under the Monetary Authority of Singapore Act 1970, Banking Act 1970, Finance Companies Act 1967 or Securities and Futures Act 2001; of contracts for fidelity bonds, performance bonds, administration bonds, bail bonds or customs bonds or similar contracts of guarantee, being contracts effected by way of business (and not merely incidental to some other business carried on by the person effecting them) in return for the payment of one or more premiums. For the purposes of this Act, the reinsurance of liabilities under insurance policies by a licensed insurer or an authorised reinsurer is treated as insurance business of the class and type to which the nature of the risk assumed or liabilities undertaken by that licensed insurer or authorised reinsurer relates. Despite subsections (1) and (2), if the Authority is satisfied that any part of an insurer’s business which belongs to a particular class or type of insurance business ought in the insurer’s case to be treated as belonging to another class or type, the Authority may direct that it is to be so treated for the purposes of this Act. For the purposes of this Act, references to carrying on insurance business include the carrying it on through an agent. For the purposes of this Act and subject to subsection (6),
For each occasion on which any insurer uses a copy of a form or brochure in contravention of subsection (4) or (5), the insurer shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $25,000 and, in the case of a continuing offence, to a further fine not exceeding $2,500 for every day or part of a day during which the offence continues after conviction.
In this section, “brochure” includes any leaflet, circular or similar advertising matter, whether printed or not.[25