The corporate regulator says insurance complaints processes, claims handling and misleading pricing are among new enforcement priorities for next year.

The priorities – which also include private credit practices and financial reporting misconduct – aim to protect consumers and uphold the integrity of markets, according to Australian Securities and Investments Commission deputy chair Sarah Court. 

“ASIC will zero in on misleading pricing practices in the financial services sector, particularly those that make everyday costs harder for Australians,” she said.

In the past 12 months the regulator has doubled its number of new investigations and nearly doubled matters filed in court as legal action is leveraged to ensure compliance.

“It doesn’t matter if there is a thick compliance manual if no one pays it any attention,” Ms Court told the ASIC annual forum in Melbourne this morning.

“It doesn’t matter if compliance professionals are in the room if poor conduct and breaches of company policy are not immediately called out.”

Ms Court says this year ASIC has prioritised insurer failures to deal fairly and in good faith with customers, pursuing court action against RACQ over comparison pricing, Hollard over a claim taking more than three years to resolve and Choosi for alleged comparison site failings.

“In the current environment, with premiums ever-increasing, claims rising and insurance becoming increasingly out of reach, we will continue our focus on this sector,” she said. “This year we will particularly look at claims and complaint handling failures.”

Ms Court says ASIC is “strongly supportive of reducing unnecessary regulatory complexity that has no regulatory benefit”, and she encouraged industry to provide specific details, while noting calls for simplicity are often at odds with demand for detailed guidance.

“Whenever a new piece of law is introduced, what effectively happens is industry comes to us at ASIC and says, ‘You need to tell us what all this means, and you need to give us these really bright black and white lines.’ ”

ASIC chair Joe Longo says Australia is “pretty good at creating legislation and creating complexity” but struggles with law reform.

“The more complex the legislation, the harder it is to enforce, and that’s not in anybody's interest,” he told the forum. “I don’t think people are against regulation. What they’re against is regulation that’s so complex it’s very costly to comply with.”