LAW OF THE REPUBLIC OF BELARUS

of January 5, 2024 No. 344-Z

About insurance activity

Accepted by the House of Representatives on December 7, 2023

Approved by Council of the Republic on December 22, 2023

Chapter 1. General provisions

Article 1. The main terms applied in this Law and their determinations

1. For the purposes of this Law and regulation of insurance activity the following main terms and their determinations are applied:

1.1. the assistans-organization - the commercial organization created for rendering technical, medical and other assistance to the insurer (insured person, the beneficiary) according to the insurance contract in case of loss occurrence;

1.2. the beneficial owner - the physical person who is owner of property or owns at least 10 percent of shares (share in authorized fund) of the insurer, insurance broker, or directly or indirectly (through the third parties) has the right or opportunity to give obligatory for the insurer, insurance broker of specifying, to influence the decisions made by them or to otherwise control their actions;

1.3. internal control - the process performed by insurance company for the purpose of ensuring the arranged and effective implementation of insurance activity according to requirements of the legislation and local legal acts of insurance company;

1.4. the beneficiary - physical person, including the individual entrepreneur, or the legal entity for benefit of whom the insurance contract is signed or is performed insurance and (or) which have the right to insurance payment according to the insurance contract or the legislation on insurance;

1.5. the state insurer - meeting the requirements of the insurer the unitary enterprise which property is in state-owned property also belongs to him on the right of economic maintaining, or economic society, 100 percent of shares (share in authorized fund) of which are in property of the Republic of Belarus or its administrative and territorial units;

1.6. diversification - the condition of implementation of investments and placement of insurance reserves by the insurer assuming them simultaneous distribution on the objects of implementation of investments and banks which are not connected with each other;

1.7. record of insurance history - the data which are part of insurance history, characterizing one insurance contract of the subject of insurance history, including insurance payments, received by it under this agreement insurance;

1.8. source of forming of insurance history - the insurance company which is the insurance agreement party, except for agreements of obligatory civil liability insurance of owners of vehicles, and also the Belarusian bureau on transportation insurance under the agreement of obligatory civil liability insurance of owners of vehicles which are representing to the Ministry of Finance of the data, being part of insurance history;

1.9. the standard rate of responsibility - the maximum amount of agreement obligations of voluntary insurance established by the Ministry of Finance (joint insurances, reinsurance) which can remain on own deduction of insurance company;

1.10. standard rates of safe functioning - the indicators of financial and economic activities of insurance companies characterizing their financial condition, stability, stability and reliability of functioning, and also degree of exposure of the market of insurance services to the risks accompanying activities of insurance companies;

1.11. merging of the insurers and (or) insurance brokers - the non-profit organization combining insurers and (or) insurance brokers, created in the form of association (union) (further - consolidation);

1.12. implementation of investments - activities of the insurer for investment of insurance reserves in securities, real estate, precious metals and other property according to the procedure, the established legislation on insurance, and also on other investment of investments which is not prohibited by the legislation for profit earning (income);

1.13. reinsurance award - the cash amount which is subject to payment by the reinsurer to the overcautious person under the agreement of reinsurance;

1.14. cooling-off period - the period which is not exceeding ten calendar days, established by the insurance contract during which the insurer - the physical person has the right to refuse the insurance contract and to receive the paid insurance premium (insurance premium) completely on condition of absence in this period of event which can be afterwards acknowledged insured event according to the insurance contract. The cooling-off period can be established by agreement of the parties if other is not provided by this Law;

1.15. users of insurance history - insurance companies, and also the state bodies and other persons who do not have according to legal acts the rights to the data which are secret of data on insurance which received the written consent of the subject of insurance history to provision of its insurance report by the Ministry of Finance also made in the Ministry of Finance inquiry for receipt of the insurance report of this subject of insurance history;

1.16. the victim - person, to life, health and (or) property of which harm as a result of insured event is done;

1.17. preliminary payment - the part of insurance payment corresponding to actually certain and documented extent of harm which the insurer has the right to pay to the insurer (to insured person, the beneficiary) according to its statement to complete definition of the size of subject to indemnification;

1.18. insurers - physical persons, the organizations, including foreign and international, and also the Republic of Belarus and its administrative and territorial units, foreign states which signed insurance contracts with insurers or being those by law or the act of the President of the Republic of Belarus;

1.19. insurance payment - the cash amount paid to the insurer (insured person, the beneficiary) in case of loss occurrence. In case of property insurance and liability insurance insurance payment is made in the form of insurance indemnity, in case of personal insurance - in the form of insurance coverage;

1.20. insurance history - the data which are stored in the Ministry of Finance which structure is determined by this Law, other acts of the legislation and which are characterized by the subject of insurance history and insurance payments received by it according to the insurance contract;

1.21. insurance sum (responsibility limit) - the cash amount established by the legal act or the insurance contract within which if other is not provided by legal acts, the insurer shall make insurance payment in case of loss occurrence. When implementing personal insurance the insurance sum or method of its determination are established by the insurer under the agreement with the insurer in the insurance contract;

1.22. insurance agent - the physical person or the organization performing intermediary activities for insurance on behalf of insurance company;

1.23. insurance broker - the commercial organization created for implementation of intermediary activities for insurance and performing such activities on its own behalf based on the order of insurance company or the insurer or at the same time each of them;

1.24. insurance premium (insurance premium) - the cash amount which is subject to payment by the insurer to the insurer for insurance if other is not established by acts of the President of the Republic of Belarus;

1.25. the insurance report - the document which contains information created by the Ministry of Finance based on the data which are part of insurance history and which the Ministry of Finance provides to users of insurance stories, subjects of insurance stories;

1.26. the insurance policy (the certificate, the certificate) - the document certifying the conclusion of the insurance contract;

1.27. insurance (reinsurance) pool - joint activities of insurance companies without formation of legal entity based on the agreement on insurance (reinsurance) pool signed by his participants;

1.28. insurance risk - the expected event having signs of probability and accident on which case of approach insurance is performed;

1.29. insured event - the event provided by the insurance contract or the legislation in case of which approach the insurer has obligation to make insurance payment to the insurer (insured person, the beneficiary);

1.30. insurance rate - rate of insurance premium from unit of insurance sum (insurance value, other base determined by rules of insurance);

1.31. the insurer - the commercial organization created for implementation of insurance activity and having the license for implementation of insurance activity (insurance organization);

1.32. the subject of insurance history - physical person, including the individual entrepreneur, the organization, including foreign and international which conclude (signed) the insurance contract and concerning which insurance history is created with the insurer;

1.33. the management reporting - the formalized and structured information on activities of insurance company (reporting) provided on regular basis on the established procedure to the owner of property (founders, participants) and (or) governing bodies of insurance company, officials for acceptance of management decisions.

2. The term "affiliates" is used in this Law in the value determined by the Law of the Republic of Belarus of December 9, 1992 No. 2020-XII "About economic societies".

Article 2. Legal regulation of the relations in the field of insurance

1. The relations in the field of insurance are governed by the civil legislation, the legislation on insurance, the legislation on licensing, international treaties of the Republic of Belarus, and also the international legal acts constituting the right of the Eurasian Economic Union.

2. The legislation on insurance is based on the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus and consists of this Law and other acts of the legislation.

3. Features of regulation of the relations regulated by this Law can be established by the president of the Republic of Belarus.

Article 3. Coverage of this Law

1. This Law governs the relations in the field of insurance.

2. Operation of this Law does not extend on:

2.1. national social insurance;

2.2. associations which are created according to the decision of the President of the Republic of Belarus and perform the activities in the procedure established by it.

3. Action of provisions of Chapter 8 of this Law does not extend to the relations:

arising from compulsory insurance from labor accidents and occupational diseases, compulsory national insurance (stipulated by the legislation compulsory insurance of life, health and (or) property of citizens at the expense of means of the relevant budget);

connected with provision by the Ministry of Finance of the separate data which are part of insurance history, to the state bodies and other persons having the right to the data which are secret of data on insurance according to legal acts, international treaties of the Republic of Belarus.

Other rules can be determined by legal acts for the state secrets, than those which are provided by Chapter 8 of this Law, for the relations arising in case of collection, storage, provision of the data constituting the state secrets or access to them and also for other relations arising in case of the address with the state secrets, forming of insurance stories, use of the data which are part of insurance history and provision of insurance reports.

4. Extends to the insurance companies performing compulsory insurance, the insurance agents and insurance brokers performing intermediary activities for compulsory insurance, operation of this Law taking into account the features established by the legal acts regulating questions of implementation of compulsory insurance.

5. Other provisions of this Law are applied to compulsory national insurance as other is not stipulated by the legislation about such insurance and does not follow from being of the corresponding relations on insurance.

Article 4. Insurance and insurance activity

1. Insurance - the relations on protection of valuable interests of citizens of the Republic of Belarus, foreign citizens, stateless persons, the organizations, including foreign and international, and also the Republic of Belarus and its administrative and territorial units, foreign states in case of approach of insured events at the expense of the insurance reserves created by insurance companies in accordance with the established procedure.

2. Insurance activity are activities for insurance, including for joint insurance and reinsurance.

Article 5. Insurance forms

1. Insurance can be performed in forms of voluntary, compulsory and imputed insurance.

2. Voluntary insurance is performed by the conclusion of the contract between the insurer and the insurer according to the civil legislation. The insurer and the insurer are free in the conclusion of the agreement of voluntary insurance.

Conditions on which the agreement of voluntary insurance is signed are determined by the rules of the corresponding type of insurance approved by the insurer or consolidation.

The insurance rate by types of voluntary insurance established by the insurer includes basic insurance rate which structure is determined by the Ministry of Finance, and the corrective coefficients applied to it (if the condition about their application is determined by rules of insurance).

The Ministry of Finance has the right to determine the minimum (standard) requirements to conditions and procedure of separate types of voluntary insurance.

For the purpose of protection of valuable interests of insurers (insured persons, beneficiaries) separate requirements to conditions and procedure of separate types of voluntary insurance can be determined by legal acts if the possibility of such insurance is caused by such legal acts.

3. By acts of the President of the Republic of Belarus the obligation on life insurance, health or property or their civil responsibility according to the procedure and on the conditions determined by such acts can be assigned to persons specified in them (compulsory insurance, except for compulsory national insurance).

4. By legal acts the obligation on life insurance, health or property or their civil responsibility as the compulsory provision of implementation of business activity or receipt of certain benefits and benefits (imputed insurance) by them can be assigned to persons specified in them.

The minimum conditions of imputed insurance, including object of insurance, insurance risks (insured events) and the minimum size of insurance sum (responsibility limit), are established by legal acts.

Other conditions of imputed insurance on which the insurance contract is signed and procedure for such insurance are determined by the rules of the corresponding type of insurance approved by the insurer or consolidation. The insurance rate is established by the insurer.

When implementing imputed insurance insurers have the right to apply the corresponding rules by types of voluntary insurance if their conditions correspond to the minimum conditions established by legal acts.

The insurance activity by types of imputed insurance is performed by insurance companies according to the requirements of this Law and other acts of the legislation on insurance established for implementation of insurance activity by types of voluntary insurance if other is not provided by this Law and other acts of the legislation on insurance.

Article 6. Objects of insurance

1. The valuable interests which are not contradicting the legislation, connected can be objects of insurance:

1.1. with achievement of certain age by physical persons or approach in their life of other insured event provided by the agreement;

1.2. with damnification of life or to health of the insurer or other physical person called in the agreement;

1.3. with compensation for expenses of the organization of health care, to the individual entrepreneur, the insurer or insured person, caused by the request of insured person for delivery of health care;

1.4. with loss (death) or damage of the property which is in ownership, use, the order of the insurer or called in the agreement of other beneficiary;

1.5. with implementation by the insurer (beneficiary) of competences of ownership, use and the order of property, and also with property requirements which arise between insurers (beneficiaries) and other persons concerning determination of destiny of property and the related rights: property rights (economic maintaining, operational management), liability laws (contractual and non-contractual), rights to results of intellectual activities;

1.6. with emergence of losses from business activity in connection with non-execution (execution in an inadequate way) the obligations partners of the insurer or change of conditions of these activities for the circumstances which are not depending on the insurer and (or) the partner of the insurer;

1.7. with expenses, including on maintaining in judicial authorities of cases, the insurer or other beneficiary called in the agreement, connected with the events provided by the insurance contract;

1.8. with responsibility according to the obligations which arose in case of causing by the insurer or the other person on whom such responsibility can be conferred, harm of life, to health or property of other persons, or with the agreement responsibility.

2. The objects of insurance specified in subitems 1.1-1.3 of Item 1 of this Article belong to personal insurance, the objects of insurance specified in subitems 1.4-1.7 of Item 1 of this Article belong to property insurance, the objects of insurance specified in subitem 1.8 of Item 1 of this Article belong to liability insurance.

3. When implementing insurance the combination of the objects of insurance relating to the different objects of property insurance specified in subitems 1.4-1.7 of Item 1 of this Article, and (or) personal insurance, specified in subitems 1.2 and 1.3 of Item 1 of this Article, and (or) liability insurance, specified in subitem 1.8 of Item 1 of this Article (comprehensive insurance) is allowed.

When implementing insurance the combination of the objects of insurance relating to the different objects of personal insurance specified in subitems 1.1-1.3 of Item 1 of this Article, except for accidents insurance and diseases for the period of trip abroad (comprehensive insurance of life) is allowed.

Article 7. Classification of types of insurance

1. Depending on object of insurance the types of insurance performed in the Republic of Belarus are subdivided into the personal insurance relating to life insurance, the personal insurance which is not relating to life insurance, property insurance and liability insurance.

2. Treat types of the personal insurance relating to life insurance:

2.1. life insurance;

2.2. life insurance of children;

2.3. life insurance;

2.4. life insurance with condition of periodical insurance payments and (or) participation of the insurer in the income of the insurer from implementation of investments;

2.5. insurance of additional pension;

2.6. insurance of additional funded pension;

2.7. other types of the personal insurance relating to life insurance.

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