The purpose of this guide is to assist you in making an informed decision about whether to use the financial services we can provide to you.
It covers who will provide those services; how we and our associates are paid; any potential conflict of interest we may have; internal and external dispute resolution procedures and how you can access them; and arrangements that are in place to compensate clients for losses.
This guide is an important document. Please read it carefully and keep it in a safe place for your reference and for any future dealings with us.
All references to “we”, “us” or “our in this FSG are references to P.I. Direct Insurance Brokers unless specified otherwise.
P.I. Direct Insurance Brokers Pty Ltd
Level 4, 15 Astor Terrace
Spring Hill Qld 4000
Phone: (07) 3387 2800
Email: pidirect@pidirect.com.au
Website: www.pidirect.com.au
Our ABN is 36 081 818 411 and our Financial Services Licence No: is 229462
We are authorised, pursuant to PID’s AFSL, to deal in
and provide financial advice in relation to general insurance products for wholesale clients.
To assist in your decision making, we will give you information about the insurance product by providing you with a Product Disclosure Statement (‘PDS’). The PDS is an important document. You should carefully read the PDS to decide if the product features suit your objectives, financial situation and needs before deciding about the insurance product. Please keep the PDS in a safe place for your reference and for any future dealings with us.
In some cases, we may make a general recommendation or give an opinion about the insurance products (‘General Advice’). We do this without consideration of your specific individual objectives, financial situation or needs. This is a General Advice service. We do not provide any advice on whether other products may be more appropriate for your needs or which of the product options may be best for you.
We can also assist when our mutual client needs to make a claim. If a claim, or potential claim, arises, contact us and we will help you assist our mutual client in deciding what to do and liaise with insurers as required on your and their behalf. We provide this assistance as part of our overall service for no additional charge. We do not continue to offer this claims service if we lose our appointment to the account.
Should we lose the appointment to the account, our assistance with any open claims shall cease with our appointment. We agree, upon your written request, to provide a copy of all claims documentation we are legally permitted to provide to you.
If we offer to arrange an insurance policy for you, we will also provide you with, or pass on to you, a PDS, unless you already have an up to date PDS. The PDS will contain information about the policy, which will enable you to make an informed decision about purchasing that policy.
When we provide financial services to you, we will be acting on your behalf. When we arrange insurance products, we are acting under an authority given by you. This means that we represent and act for you not the insurer or underwriting agency.
Sometimes we will act under a binder or agency agreement from an insurer. When we act under a binder or agency agreement, we will be acting as the agent of the insurer. This means that we represent and act for the insurer, not for you. We will tell you when we act under a binder or agency to arrange your insurance or advise you about your insurance needs.
You need to give us instructions, in writing by letter, fax, or email in accordance with the details provided in this FSG.
We support the General Insurance Code of Practice. The Code is designed to raise the standard of practice and service in the general insurance industry.
For further information about the Code, please go to www.codeofpractice.com.au or contact us.
If you ask us to arrange an insurance product, we will collect information from you for the purpose of P.I. Direct arranging the insurance product and disclose such information to the underwriting agency and/or insurer in relation to them deciding whether to issue the insurance product, and if so, on what terms. If we agree to arrange the relevant insurance, where necessary, we will use the information to manage rights and obligations under the insurance product.
We are committed to a privacy policy which deals with the privacy and security of your personal information.
We do not trade, rent or sell your information.
For a full privacy collection statement, please refer to the PDS. To access PID’s privacy policy, please go to www.pidirect.com.au
If you wish to examine your file or have a copy of this privacy policy sent to you, please ask us. We will arrange for this to occur.
We will retain this FSG and any other FSG given to you as well as any PDS that we give or pass on to you for the period required by law.
We receive income from the following sources;
Payment for the services we provide to you is payable directly to us. When we issue or arrange an insurance product, we charge a premium, on behalf of the insurer, based on the risk profile you have provided. The total amount you pay is the premium plus any government charges. These may include GST and stamp duty. We will collect the premium from you and remit it to the insurer.
You can choose to pay the premium by any of the payment methods set out in your invoice. You are required to pay us within the timeframe set out in the invoice.
All collected premium, applicable fees and statutory charges are to be held in a trust account in accordance with statutory provisions.
We may receive a commission from the insurer for arranging the insurance on your behalf.
The commission payable by the insurer is calculated as a percentage of the base premium, excluding government charges and any fees payable by you. The commission is included in the total amount you pay for your contract of insurance.
When you pay your premium, it will be banked into a trust account. We will retain the commission from the premium you pay and remit the balance to the insurer in accordance with any arrangements with the insurer. Interest will be earned on the premium while it is in our trust account and retained by us.
The commission applies to each policy arranged or renewed through us. The commission may not be refundable in the event of cancellation unless the insurance policy is cancelled either within the cooling off period or is a full-term cancellation.
We also charge a Placement Fee (plus GST) when placing or renewing a policy on your behalf. The exact fee will vary depending on the policy we are placing and will be noted on your quotation documentation and tax invoice. Such fees include meeting the overall costs of our services including preparation and issuance of documentation, and policy adjustments and claims management services as required.
The Placement fee is not refundable in the event of cancellation unless the insurance policy is a full terms cancellation.
Our employees that will assist you with your insurance needs will be paid a market salary. Additionally, they may earn cash bonuses or other incentives based on achievement of a broad range of PID goals, including financial targets.
From time to time our employees may also receive what are commonly referred to as “soft dollar benefits” from product issuers and other financial service providers we deal with.
These can include entertainment (eg: lunches, sporting events, movies etc), conferences, accommodation and travel, gifts (eg: product issuer or service provider branded promotional items and on other occasions small gifts such as bottles of wine, cakes or hampers on special occasions etc).
These benefits are provided by a wide range of product issuers and service providers. In most cases they relate to our development of an understanding of the product issuer and / or service provider and their product range and practices. Ultimately, this assists us in better serving and representing you.
Our policy is that any “soft dollar benefits” received by our staff that exceed $300 per item or transaction in estimated value are potentially material.
In these cases, they must be disclosed to our Managing Director and Compliance Manager who will determine if appropriate procedures are in place to manage or avoid any potential conflict of interest which might arise. They will retain a record of all such benefits.
This restriction does not apply to conferences or functions, the principle purpose of which is professional development and where the right to attend is not based on sales volumes.
We are a wholly owned subsidiary of Steadfast Group Ltd (ABN 98 073 659 677) (‘SGL’).
We have access to shared services from SGL, including compliance tools, manuals and training as well as legal, banking and group purchasing arrangements. These services are funded by SGL, subsidised by SGL or SGL receives a fee for them.
SGL has arrangements with the insurer, as with some other insurers, under which SGL may receive between 0.5% – 1.5% commission of the base premium paid (excluding government charges) for some products arranged by us with the insurer of this product. SGL may share part of that commission with us. SGL’s FSG is available at www.steadfast.com.au or on request by telephoning SGL’s Company Secretary on +61 2 9495 6500.
In accordance with the Insurance Contracts Act 1984 (Cth) you have a duty of disclosure. For the full wording of your duty of disclosure, please refer to the PDS.
We take any potential and actual conflicts of interest seriously and have a conflict of interest policy. Conflicts of interest are circumstances where some or all of your interests are or may be inconsistent with or diverge from some or all of our interests. We manage conflicts of interest through adequate controls, disclosure and avoidance. We also provide training to our employees to identify conflicts of interest and encourage the early reporting of potential conflicts of interest.
PID have a professional indemnity insurance policy (PI policy) in place.
The PI policy covers us for claims made against us as a result of our conduct or conduct by our employees in the provision of financial services.
P.I. Direct Insurance Brokers Pty Ltd subscribes to the Insurance Brokers Code of Practice and is a member of the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA). As part of the Code obligations, we are committed to the fair, transparent and timely resolution of disputes.
If you are unhappy with any of our services, please lodge your complaint in writing or contact our Complaints Manager Mr. Paul Burton.
Postal Address: Level 4, 15 Astor Terrace,
Spring Hill QLD 4000
Email: paul@pidirect.com.au
Phone: (07) 3387 2816
We will acknowledge your complaint in writing and genuinely attempt to resolve your complaint fairly and efficiently within 20 days through our internal disputes resolution system.
If we do not resolve your complaint to your satisfaction, the complaint will be handled by our or the insurer’s internal panel. If it is to be handled by us, we will respond in writing within fifteen (15) business days of the date you advise that you wish to proceed to Stage 2, provided all the necessary information has been provided and any investigation required has been completed.
If we are unable to resolve your complaint within forty-five (45) business days of the date we first received your complaint or if your complaint has not been resolved to your satisfaction, you can lodge your complaint with the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (‘AFCA’) depending on eligibility related to your policy. AFCA provides fair and independent financial services complaint resolution that is free to consumers. You can contact AFCA by:
Post: Australian Financial Complaints Authority GPO Box 3 Melbourne Vic 3001
Phone: 1800 931 678 (free call)
Website: www.afca.org.au
Email: info@afca.org.au
If you would like more information about us, please contact us by phone, in writing by email as set out in this document.