In the past two fiscal years, the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario (FSRA) imposed $1.7 million in administrative monetary penalties on the sectors it oversees.
In 2023–24, FSRA imposed administrative monetary penalties of $1,151,454, and in 2022–23, penalties of $576,000 — for a total of $1.7 million — the regulator’s enforcement and licensing report, released Thursday, says. The year-over-year increase can be attributed in part to $690,000 in penalties in the auto insurance sector, up from $120,000 in 2022–23.
In the life and health insurance sector, administrative monetary penalties totalled $186,000 in 2023–24, down from $375,500 the previous year. Still, FSRA imposed the majority of sanctions in life and health, along with the mortgage sector. Over the two fiscal years, these sectors had a total of 36 sanctions each.
In these two sectors, “licensing action and compliance orders were used to protect consumers from bad actors, and to prevent and remediate misconduct,” the report says.
In 2023–24, FSRA initiated formal regulatory enforcement against 48 subjects, the report says. This includes 26 proposals to revoke or refuse licensing, two proposed compliance orders and a total of $2,766,500 in proposed administrative penalties.
Regarding licensing suitability, 133 applications across sectors were escalated for action in 2023–24, down from 144 the previous year, the report says. The top suitability issues resulting in escalations were consistent for both fiscal years: insolvency, criminal records and other regulatory actions. In both years, the outcome of most escalated files was the placement of conditions on the licence.
Escalations during the licensing process can also result in other actions, such as monetary penalties, refusal of application or warning letters. The number of warning letters issued regarding licence applications was 814 in 2023–24 and 826 in 2022–23. In each fiscal year, most of the letters were issued in the insurance sector for non-compliance with continuing education (CE) requirements — 635 warning letters in 2023–24, and 630 in 2022–23 (about 75% of warning letters each year). In September 2022, FSRA implemented enhancements to CE reporting requirements, the report says.
As of March 31, 2024, FSRA licensed 69,268 insurance agents.