Rebecca Glenn

A new report released today by the Centre for Women’s Economic Safety (CWES) calls for general insurers to disrupt domestic violence in Australia by re-designing products to prevent financial abuse.

Rebecca Glenn, CEO of CWES, says the second Designed to Disrupt discussion paper proposes a Financial Safety by Design framework for general insurers to make it harder for perpetrators to misuse products and services as a tactic of coercive control.

“We are seeing abusers use a range of tactics to manipulate insurance products to cause harm, including vehicle, home and contents, and personal insurance products,” Ms Glenn said.

“For example, perpetrators of abuse change or cancel joint policies without the knowledge of their partner or former partner, or redirect the payment of claims to accounts that partners do not know about or cannot access.

“In many cases, insurance policy terms and conditions prevent the payment of claims for damage caused by a policy holder. In instances where an abuser deliberately damages an asset covered by a joint policy, a victim-survivor may have an insurance claim denied.

“These actions may leave victim-survivors, usually women, in very difficult financial circumstances, with damaged assets and no recourse through insurance.

“But there are simple steps insurers can take to assist victim-survivors of financial abuse and to prevent it from occurring in the first place.”

The report makes 19 recommendations that aims to spark discussions with the 90 general insurers in Australia, plus government, regulators and consumer advocates. It calls for:

• All general insurers to close loopholes that enable perpetrators to cancel insurance policies without the knowledge or consent of victim-survivors
• The general insurance industry to include a ‘conduct of others’ clause as a standard, enabling victim-survivors to make a claim when perpetrators deliberately damage property
• The government to modernise the General Insurance Act so that products can be redesigned with features that protect against financial abuse.

Report author and UNSW School of Social Sciences Adjunct Associate Professor Catherine Fitzpatrick said, “General insurance is designed to provide financial protection from unexpected events. But too often victim-survivors of domestic and financial abuse find they don’t have the coverage they thought – either through deliberate tactics of perpetrators or due to common insurance rules and exclusions which penalise them.

“While insurers are making improvements, our research found a lack of consistency across the industry. This means some victim-survivors will receive support that is empathetic and trauma-informed, with flexibility that enables solutions tailored to their individual needs. Others continue to struggle with dismissive or judgmental staff, risks to their safety or compounding financial hardship.

“The Insurance Contracts Act needs to be modernised to strike a fairer deal for victim-survivors and create consistency across the sector, with a clear framework for insurance companies already working hard to update their policies, processes and practices to improve customer outcomes.

“If the law can contemplate foreseeable risks like floods, it could reasonably include the risk of domestic and financial abuse.”

Co-CEO of Financial Counselling Australia, Dr Domenique Meyrick said, “this significant report from CWES is anchored in lived experience and echoes what financial counsellors are seeing in their casework.

“There’s so much that the insurance sector can do to prevent its products from being weaponised and to support people affected by financial abuse.

“The Designed to Disrupt report on general insurance promises to be a powerful catalyst for change.”

Economic abuse includes financial abuse and is a form of domestic and family violence where a partner or family member exerts control through economic resources, including money, banking, insurance products, employment, transport and property, to limit a person’s autonomy and undermine their economic wellbeing.

At least 1.6 million women will experience economic abuse during the course of their life, with a direct cost to victim-survivors estimated to be $5.7 billion each year.

On International Women’s Day, the Centre for Women’s Economic Safety is urging general insurers to recognise how their products are misused and take strong action to prevent financial abuse.

Designed to Disrupt: Reimagining general insurance products to improve financial safety is the second in a series discussing how the finance sector can identify and mitigate the risks of financial abuse. It follows the launch of a 2022 paper looking at the banking industry. Since then,14 Australian banks have updated their terms and conditions to recognise financial abuse.

Read the report.

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Rebecca Glenn

The Centre for Women’s Economic Safety (CWES) has welcomed the move by another of Australia’s big four banks to address financial abuse in its Terms and Conditions.

ANZ has announced new Terms and Conditions (T&Cs) on its digital transaction and savings product which state that financial abuse is unacceptable conduct and that people who inflict financial abuse through the product may be warned or exited from the bank.

It follows announcements by NAB, Westpac and the Commonwealth Bank that they will change their terms and conditions on a range of bank products to address financial abuse.

The announcement comes in response to recommendations in the CWES’ Designed to Disrupt report, which called on banks to redesign products to improve financial safety.

CEO of CWES, Rebecca Glenn, says “All four of Australia’s big banks have now adopted the recommendation to change Terms and Conditions.

“This is a significant step in the right direction to explicitly challenge financially abusive behaviour.

“Any action banks can take to mitigate harm experienced by victim-survivors of financial abuse and make it harder for perpetrators to misuse products, is welcome news.”

Designed to Disrupt author and Adjunct Associate Professor at UNSW School of Social Sciences, Catherine Fitzpatrick, says “Customers of Australia’s major banks are now on notice that misusing their products and services as a tactic of coercive control is unacceptable.

“I’d encourage everyone to read the fine print of their bank accounts and ask their bank what they are doing to protect victim-survivors of financial abuse and to put perpetrators on notice. If all Australian banks followed the lead of the big four, it would send a clear message to the community that it’s not okay to control people through their access to money.”

Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner Micaela Cronin welcomed the announcement saying, “These are practical changes that will make a meaningful difference for people escaping violence.

“The four banks have shown real community leadership in recognising that the systems we build can be weaponised, and being proactive in redesigning those systems to prevent harm.”

Financial Counselling Australia CEO, Fiona Guthrie, says “Financial counsellors will be delighted that all of the major banks have acted to stamp out financial abuse by changing the terms and conditions of their products. Well done ANZ, Comm Bank, NAB and Westpac. 2

“We now call on the rest of the banking industry to make the same changes. It is never acceptable for people to use the banking system to perpetrate financial abuse. Sending someone an abusive message through a banking transaction is not a benign act. It is a deliberate strategy by the sender, often designed to harass, threaten or incite fear in the recipient.

“Changing the terms and conditions to be clear that this kind of behaviour is unacceptable is an important step in reducing family violence. But safety by design is an all encompassing approach. The next stage is for the banking industry to look at all of their products using a safety lens aiming to reduce, and if possible, prevent financial abuse.

“All of us have a role to play in reducing family violence and it is good to see the major banks playing their part.”

In its Designed to Disrupt report published late last year, CWES called on all Australian banks to redesign products to improve financial safety. It called for banks to start by changing their terms and conditions to make it clear that a bank account is no place for abuse and that they will take action against customers who misuse their products to cause harm.

In March, CWES conducted a desktop review of the T&Cs of the 20 Australian Banking Association (ABA) member banks to measure the baseline and found:

• None of the 20 banks referenced financial abuse in T&Cs.
• 9 banks describe the misuse of payment descriptions to send abuse as unacceptable behaviour.
• 6 banks describe the consequences for the misuse of payment descriptions to send abuse, with 4 citing it as a reason to close an account.

The Designed to Disrupt report draws on the eSafety Commission’s Safety by Design for the technology sector and proposes the finance sector commit to a tailored framework. The report outlines changes to financial product design to improve safety and counter the ways products are weaponised. For example, setting up every joint account with separate passwords, logins and portals for each person so it’s simpler and safer to separate if the relationship ends or is abusive.

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Rebecca Glenn

The Centre for Women’s Economic Safety (CWES) has hailed the inclusion of ‘economic abuse’ in the new National Plan to Eliminate Violence Against Women and Children 2022 to 2032, as a breakthrough moment in Australia’s efforts to address the scourge of domestic and family violence.

“For the first time, there is national recognition of the importance of addressing economic abuse in women’s experiences of domestic and family violence,” said Rebecca Glenn, CEO of the CWES.

“For too long, women’s experiences of economic abuse have been made invisible despite the significant impact it has on their safety, wellbeing and choices. The last national plan didn’t even mention economic abuse.

“Despite recognition that women who experience domestic and family violence experience higher rates of poverty, we haven’t focused enough on how perpetrators create this outcome by their actions to restrict, exploit and sabotage their partner’s economic resources.

“The National Plan outlines some of the key steps we can take as a society, across all sectors, to improve outcomes for women who currently face the unenviable choice between violence or poverty,” said Ms Glenn.

Economic abuse is one of six key areas of focus in the new National Plan, alongside the interconnected issues of coercive control, technology-facilitated abuse and intimate partner homicide.

“We know that without economic safety, there is no safety, and we’re delighted that this has now been recognised and incorporated into a national strategy to eliminate domestic and family violence.

“We also welcome the focus on lived experience insights informing policies and solutions. Without the work being in grounded in people’s lived experiences, we can inadvertently end up with a lot of platitudes and wasted money.

“CWES looks forward to playing its part in the National Plan by working with people and organisations across sectors to address economic abuse.

“We will be launching a Discussion Paper next month that outlines the role banks can play in reimagining the design of their products so they are less able to be weaponised by perpetrators to cause financial harm.”

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