Sign up to create alerts for Instruments,
Economic Events and content by followed authors
Free Sign Up Already have an account? Sign In
Quotes
All Instrument Types
- All Instrument Types
- Indices
- Equities
- ETFs
- Funds
- Commodities
- Currencies
- Crypto
- Bonds
- Certificates
Please try another search
🙌 It's Here: the Only Stock Screener You'll Ever Need Get Started
Australia's Westpac unit penalised for charging incorrect insurance fees
Published Apr 08, 2022 04:13AM ET
Updated Apr 08, 2022 04:18AM ET
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: An office building with Westpac logo is seen amidst the easing of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions in the Central Business District of Sydney, Australia, June 3, 2020. Picture taken June 3, 2020. REUTERS/Loren Elliott/
(Reuters) - Australia's Federal Court on Friday ordered lender Westpac Banking (NYSE:WBK) Corp's superannuation agent to pay A$20 million ($14.96 million) in penalty for incorrect insurance charges.
The court said BT Funds Management had incorrectly charged its superannuation fund members insurance premiums that included commission payments, despite a ban on such commissions under the 2013 Future of Financial Advice reforms.
BT Funds, the court said, had continued to charge these commissions until 2020.
The court also found BT Funds misrepresented members in their periodic statements, indicating that proper deductions were made even though such actions were not permitted.
Australian banks and financial institutions have been under scrutiny since an inquiry by the Royal Commission in 2018 found widespread shortcomings, forcing overhaul in the sector.
Friday's penalty order comes after six civil penalty proceedings filed by financial watchdog Australian Securities and Investment commission (ASIC) against the bank last November, alleging widespread compliance failures across many businesses.
Westpac and ASIC had then together proposed a A$113 million penalty to the Federal Court, with the lender saying it will remediate A$80 million to affected customers.
"Westpac and ASIC (had) jointly submitted agreed proposed penalties for each of the proceedings. These penalties remain subject to court approval and have been substantially provisioned in our full-year 2021 results," Westpac said.
Meanwhile, the ASIC said on Friday Westpac has indicated it will pay over A$9.8 million in remediation to over 9,900 members by July 2022.
($1 = 1.3371 Australian dollars)
Related Articles
Add Chart to Comment
Confirm Block
Are you sure you want to block %USER_NAME%?
By doing so, you and %USER_NAME% will not be able to see any of each other's Investing.com's posts.
%USER_NAME% was successfully added to your Block List
Since you’ve just unblocked this person, you must wait 48 hours before renewing the block.
Report this comment
I feel that this comment is:
Comment flagged
Thank You!
Your report has been sent to our moderators for review
Add a Comment
We encourage you to use comments to engage with other users, share your perspective and ask questions of authors and each other. However, in order to maintain the high level of discourse we’ve all come to value and expect, please keep the following criteria in mind:
Enrich the conversation, don’t trash it.
Stay focused and on track. Only post material that’s relevant to the topic being discussed.
Be respectful. Even negative opinions can be framed positively and diplomatically. Avoid profanity, slander or personal attacks directed at an author or another user. Racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination will not be tolerated.
Perpetrators of spam or abuse will be deleted from the site and prohibited from future registration at Investing.com’s discretion.