Flanagan, Anne --- "E-Commerce: The Regulation of Insurance in the Age of the Internet" [2012] ELECD 176; in Burling, Julian; Lazarus, Kevin (eds), "Research Handbook on International Insurance Law and Regulation" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: Research Handbook on International Insurance Law and Regulation

Editor(s): Burling, Julian; Lazarus, Kevin

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849807883

Section: Chapter 22

Section Title: E-Commerce: The Regulation of Insurance in the Age of the Internet

Author(s): Flanagan, Anne

Number of pages: 32

Extract:

22 E-Commerce: the regulation of insurance in the age
of the internet
Anne Flanagan



1. INTRODUCTION
Insurance has been a transnational business for centuries. However, it is not surprising
that the insurance industry was not an early adopter of the Johnny-come-lately, `border-
less' internet with insurance's traditional methods of doing business based on verification,
assessment and pricing of individual risks, established local channels of distribution tied
to independent brokers and complex regulatory requirements that typically follow juris-
dictional boundaries. All businesses are, however, under pressure to use IT to innovate,
hone business models, differentiate services, add value, lower costs, monitor performance
and provide enhanced customer satisfaction that can arise from greater efficiency and
timeliness of standardised global processing and customisation of services and to exploit
IP, data and knowledge in new ways.1 They are also driven to develop new markets and
create broader brand awareness including via the social networking technologies. Thus,
the insurance industry is now nearly globally pursuing these efficiencies and other benefits
of the internet.
While various legal issues arise in implementing electronic systems for business opera-
tions and processes, few are uniquely significant to the insurance industry, and these likely
arising from the interface of laws governing electronic commerce with insurance regula-
tion which this chapter considers. As the former are also important to insurance industry
businesses, a brief examination of some of these is worthwhile. This chapter addresses
such e-commerce legislation designed to enable valid formation of contracts online ...