ASIC's Record 2025-26: $830 Million in Court-Ordered Penalties, Up Eightfold, and the Insurance Cases Behind the Warning to Insurers

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has published enforcement figures for 2025-26 that dwarf the previous year's, and Insurance Business has set out what they mean for insurers. According to the figures published on July 20, 2026, ASIC secured $830 million in court-ordered civil penalties and $644 million in consumer remediation payments during the 2025-26 financial year. In 2024-25, it secured $104.1 million in civil penalties, so the latest total is roughly eight times as large. ASIC also reported 25 criminal convictions, more than 250 investigations, 32 civil proceedings and 18 criminal prosecutions.

The headline figure needs context. Insurance Business lists the largest penalties, and they are not insurance cases. Union Standard International Group was ordered to pay $300 million over misconduct involving contracts for difference, a single order that accounts for more than a third of the total. HSBC Bank Australia was ordered to pay $35 million over scam protection failures, with about $21.5 million in consumer compensation paid to date. Walker Stores was ordered to pay $33.5 million for unlawful credit practices that overcharged consumers by about $20 million. Westpac was ordered to pay $26 million over failures in responding to customer hardship requests, and Mercer Super $10.3 million for failing to report significant breaches to ASIC. The ASIC release itself does not contain the insurance cases below, which come from Insurance Business's account.

The most direct insurance-related penalty concerned a superannuation trustee. The Federal Court ordered United Super Pty Ltd, the trustee of Cbus, to pay $23.5 million over unreasonable delays affecting more than 7,000 members and claimants in processing death benefits and total and permanent disability insurance claims. Separate civil penalty proceedings against AustralianSuper, filed in March 2025 over alleged delays in processing death benefit claims, remain before the courts. For life insurers that provide group cover through superannuation funds, Insurance Business notes that such cases create compliance exposure that extends into service-level arrangements with trustees and does not sit with fund governance alone.

The coverage also lists actions against insurers and intermediaries filed in 2025. ASIC sued Hollard Insurance Partners Limited in April 2025, alleging that it breached its duty of utmost good faith by taking nearly three and a half years to resolve a storm damage claim from a couple in regional Victoria. In September 2025 it sued RACQ Insurance over more than 570,000 renewal documents that allegedly contained misleading "last period premium" representations over more than five years, despite customer complaints. It also sued Choosi Pty Ltd for allegedly misleading prospective customers through its funeral and life insurance comparison services. These are allegations, and the article does not report outcomes. In June 2025, ASIC reviewed the home insurer action plan across seven insurers, AAI Limited (Suncorp), Allianz Australia, Auto & General, Hollard Insurance Company, Insurance Australia Group, QBE Insurance and Youi, and found weak systemic oversight of independent expert reports and cash settlement fact sheets that offered minimal information on review rights.

ASIC has said where it is heading. Insurance Business reports that insurance complaints and claims handling are among its 2026 enforcement priorities, alongside private credit, financial reporting misconduct and misleading pricing. Sarah Court, in a November 2025 speech, described an environment "with premiums ever-increasing, claims rising, and insurance becoming increasingly out of reach," and said: "Where we see serious harm or risks to market integrity, we will act quickly." Death benefit claim volumes rose 10% in the twelve months to October 2025, and the regulator expects that growth to accelerate given Australia's ageing population.

The article draws several lessons for insurers. General insurers must notify ASIC within 30 calendar days of a reportable situation, and ASIC regards a failure to report as likely to be a significant breach in itself, as the Mercer Super penalty shows. The General Insurance Code of Practice contains financial hardship provisions comparable to those Westpac was penalised for breaching. The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority's 2025-26 corporate plan signals stronger supervision and a willingness to take formal enforcement action. The Financial Accountability Regime was extended to insurers and their licensed non-operating holding companies from March 15, 2025, adding individual accountability for senior executives.

The pattern across these cases is consistent: the alleged failures are about time and clarity, not about novel legal questions. A claim that takes years to resolve, a renewal notice that misstates the previous premium, or a breach that is not reported within the required window are all things an insurer can measure internally. That is why the coverage presents the figures as a warning: the regulator is choosing cases where the conduct is easy to describe to a court and the harm to consumers is easy to see. For policyholders, the practical point is that delays and unclear communication are not only service problems but can be breaches that carry penalties. For insurers, the sensible response is to look at how long claims take, what renewal letters say and whether breaches are reported on time. Because the totals are dominated by a few very large orders, and because the insurance cases are mostly still allegations, readers should treat this as a signal of regulatory direction and not as proof that insurance penalties rose eightfold.