Tenth quarterly update of icares Improvement Program released
This update sets out Promontory Australia’s observations on icare’s progress in addressing the McDougall and GAC Recommendations during the period from 1 February 2024 to 30 April 2024.
icare continues to make significant progress on the completion of its Improvement Program, according to independent assurer Promontory Australia.
Promontory recognised that during the Reporting Period icare had made significant progress towards completing the Improvement Program on 30 June 2024. This included Promontory’s assessment of a further 25 recommendations as complete and effective in the period, taking the total number of recommendations assessed as complete and effective to 89 (of 107) complete.
Promontory noted that during the period icare had:
- Completed the Design and Implement Phase for all 61 Initiatives.
- Completed the Embed Phase for 97 percent of the Initiatives.
The report acknowledged the substantial strides icare has made during the period including the completion of all activities on the Enterprise Sustainability and Culture and Accountability streams. This means, four (4) of the six (6) Enterprise Improvement (EI) streams are now complete.
The five (5) Nominal Insurer streams have also completed all activities, enabling the closure of those initiatives. These initiatives have provided a significant uplift in the capability of icare’s and CSPs’ claims management teams and improvements in governance and reporting.
Promontory’s update highlighted the uplift in accountability, performance management, remuneration, values and culture at icare through the Culture and Accountability stream successfully addressing all of its recommendations.
Similarly, they also acknowledged that the Enterprise Sustainability stream has delivered improved capital management, consistent tracking and management of benefits realisation, greater integrity in cost allocation, and greater transparency on financial sustainability.
It is encouraging to have Promontory acknowledge the improvements icare has made through this Program and its contribution to better outcomes for those we serve.
The update also discussed the risks and challenges facing icare, particularly with respect to the further work required on the Risk Uplift and Customer Uplift streams which may impact the closure of some recommendations. They also noted icare has plans to place to manage these challenges.
While the Improvement Program will formally close on 30 June 2024, with the Final Closure Report by Promontory being delivered on 31 July 2024, any outstanding work will be assured by Promontory and addressed in a Final Closure Memo in January 2025.
