More than half of the 56 insurance firms operating in Kenya were fined for regulatory breaches, including missed reporting deadlines, underscoring transition challenges under new accounting rules.
Fresh disclosures show insurers paid Sh80.21 million in fines in 2024 to the Insurance Regulatory Authority (IRA) amid struggles to comply with International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) 17. The standard, which took effect on January 1, 2023, replaces IFRS 4 and marks one of the most significant overhauls in insurance accounting in two decades.
IFRS 17 is designed to improve transparency, consistency and comparability in reporting insurance contracts. However, its implementation has proved difficult for many firms.
The shift to IFRS 17 triggered widespread delays in submitting quarterly and annual financial returns. The IRA says 33 insurers missed deadlines for either quarterly or annual reports.
The Insurance Act requires insurers to submit unaudited financial statements, including revenue accounts, balance sheets and profit and loss statements, within 30 days after the end of each quarter.
“An insurer that fails to comply shall be liable to a penalty of Sh200,000 and a further penalty of Sh10,000 for each day after the expiry of the prescribed period during which the insurer remains non-compliant,” the Act states.
Reporting delays have also disrupted the regulator’s own timelines, pushing publication of the 2024 annual report into this year. Industry data remains current only up to September 2025, signalling a lag in restoring normal disclosure cycles.
Data hurdles
The Association of Kenya Insurers (AKI) says IFRS 17 requires more granular reporting, exposing gaps in data and system capabilities across the industry.
Historical data, the lobby notes, is often missing, inconsistent or spread across legacy IT systems that cannot support the complex modelling required under the new rules.
The missed deadlines, alongside other unspecified breaches, saw 33 insurers fined a combined Sh80.21 million. In addition, 10 brokers were fined Sh1.48 million for similar reporting failures.
The IRA did not detail all offences by individual firms, but identified delayed or incomplete submissions as the most common issue.
Separately, eight insurers and four brokers were fined Sh1.6 million and Sh20,000 respectively for breaching anti-money laundering regulations.
Rising penalties
Total fines on insurers and brokers related to reporting breaches and violations of the Proceeds of Crime and Anti-Money Laundering Act reached Sh83.32 million in 2024. This marks a sharp increase from Sh31.75 million in 2023, though still below the record Sh94.85 million in 2022.
The largest penalties were imposed on Invesco Assurance (Sh34.3 million), Jubilee Allianz General (Sh9.46 million), MUA Insurance (Sh6.03 million), Trident Insurance (Sh4.18 million), The Monarch (Sh3.46 million) and Corporate Insurance (Sh2.93 million). Trident and Corporate Insurance are now under statutory management.
Insurers fined Sh200,000 each for anti-money laundering breaches include Equity Life, GA Life, Kenindia Assurance Life, Kenya Orient Life, KUSCCO Mutual Assurance (under statutory management), Madison Life, Kenya Alliance Insurance and The Monarch Insurance Life.
The IRA says the affected firms failed to conduct independent audits of their anti-money laundering compliance programmes, a key safeguard against handling proceeds of crime.
Most insurers penalised in 2024 have faced repeated sanctions in recent years, including for late payment of licence fees, delayed claims settlement and late submission of financial statements.
