Competitiveness authority fines insurance companies

TIRANA, March.27 – Competitiveness Authority announced that it has fined the insurance companies with a penalty worth 2 percent of their annual revenues for 2005. the measure has been taken for those companies not respecting the law on sale of Border Insurances, such as : “Sigma” , “Sigal” , “Atlantik” , “Intersig” , “Interalbanian” , “Albsig” , “Insig” , “Eurosig” . The report of the Authority explains that the Border Insurance should be sold by one single agent and the revenues will be distributed by the Finance Ministry according to the relative weight in the market of the insurance companies regarding compulsive insurance policies.
The Authority also nullified the agreement between 8 companies reached on April 5 of 2005 for the “Constituting the Pool of Border Insurance Provision to third parties and vehicle holders.”
The agreement was evaluated as a trust agreement that violates free market practices given the fixed price. The Competitiveness Authority realized investigation to confirm its doubts about this agreement and reached the conclusion after receiving data from all engaged parties. The Competitiveness Authority criticized many of the decisions of the Finance Ministry and called for a more correct legal framework. The supervision was recommended to be done by the Financial Supervision Authority.