The relationship between compliance function and legal department of the insurance company in the light of the Solvency II Directive

Abstract

The compliance function, in accordance with the provisions of the Solvency II Directive, is one of the key functions in the insurance company. Bearing in mind that compliance function is relatively young function in these companies, organizing this function as a separate organizational unit can be challenging. For these reasons, it is important to determine whether this function can be organized as a part of the legal department of the insurance company. However, unlike the compliance function, the Directive does not mention the legal department of insurance undertaking. Certainly, the most adequate is to organize compliance function as an independent organizational unit. On the other hand, in order not to overburden small and medium-sized companies, the Directive introduces the principle of proportionality. By introducing this principle Directive gives the opportunity to companies to adjust the organization of key functions to the nature, scale and complexity of the risks that exist in the insurance undertaking. In the paper, the author analyzes the relationship between the compliance function and the legal department, first by analyzing their competences, and then their characteristics. The goal is to determine whether there are obstacles to organizing these two functions within the same organizational unit.

Keywords

• insurance company
• key function
• solvency ii
• compliance function
• legal department
• principle of proportionality
• fit and proper