FIDA in the Insurance Sector

FIDA (Financial Data Access) is intended to create a framework for accessing and using customer data in the financial sector. Data users (i.e. firms that want to access customer data to provide innovative services) currently have difficulties accessing data held by dataholders (i.e. financial institutions that collect, store and process that customer data). As a result, even where customers so wish, they do not have widespread access to data-driven financial services and financial products. FIDA’s intended objective is to create a harmonised framework for access to financial data, for facilitating the transition from the traditional supply of standardised products to tailored solutions.

Establishing high quality interfaces for exchanging customer data

A range of options were reviewed for establishing high quality interfaces for exchanging customer data.

• One possible option might be to oblige data holders to put in place application programming interfaces (APIs) implementing the common standards for data and interfaces and make them available to data users without a contract and free of charge.
• Another option would be to allow reasonable compensation to set up and use the interfaces and agree on contractual liability.

Potential Effects

The European Commission’s hope for FIDA is that

• consumers and firms alike profit from financial products and services that are tailored to their requirements based on relevant data, thereby becoming more user-centric, and also improving the overall price-quality relationship,
• financial institutions will be able to take greater advantage of digital transformation trends,
• third-party service providers will enjoy new business opportunities in data-driven innovation, and
• it will result in more efficient provision of services and the acceleration of data-driven business models in the EU financial sector as a result of more effective competition.

Control over data

Customers must have effective control over their data and confidence in managing permissions they have granted in accordance with the Regulation. Data holders should therefore be required to provide customers with common and consistent financial data access permission dashboards. The permission dashboard should empower the customer to manage their permissions in an informed and impartial manner and give customers a strong measure of control over how their personal and non-personal data is used (Recital 21 and Article 8 FIDA).