Insurance brokers and advisers in New Zealand, city by city

QuoteHub advises on life, health, trauma and income cover across New Zealand. Financial advice is provided by Craig Smith Business Services Limited, trading as Smiths Insurance & KiwiSaver, a licensed Financial Advice Provider (FSP712931). QuoteHub is a trading name. Our only office is in Christchurch; advice everywhere else is given by phone and video, and each city page says so rather than implying otherwise.

Broker or adviser: which one are you looking for?

Most people searching for insurance help in New Zealand type "broker", and most of the firms they find for life and health cover are financial advisers. The words are not interchangeable, and the difference is worth knowing before you pick one.

"Broker" is the everyday term and is used most often in general insurance: house, car, contents and business cover. "Financial adviser" is the regulated term. Anyone giving regulated advice on life, health, trauma or income protection in New Zealand does so under a licensed Financial Advice Provider, is subject to the Code of Professional Conduct for Financial Advice Services, and must disclose what they are paid and by whom before you apply. QuoteHub sits on that side of the line.

In practice that means three things you can hold an adviser to. The advice has to put your interests first rather than the insurer's. What the adviser is paid, and by which insurer, is disclosed in writing before you commit to anything. And if the advice is poor there is a free dispute resolution scheme to go to, which is not true of a comparison table you filled in yourself.

What this costs

There is no fee for the conversation. Advisers in this market are paid commission by the insurer when cover is placed, and that is disclosed in writing before you apply. You are under no obligation to take the advice, and you can take the research and do nothing with it.

What no adviser in New Zealand can do is place cover with every insurer in the country. We compare the insurers on our panel, the panel is published, and each insurer page says plainly whether that insurer is on it. Anyone implying they compare the whole market is describing something that does not exist here.

Why each city page names its hospitals

Life, trauma and income protection pay a sum of money, so where you live does not change them. Health cover is different, because it pays for treatment in a building, and which buildings are near you is a fact about your city rather than about your policy.

Across these six cities we hold records for 18 private hospitals, and they are distributed very unevenly. Auckland has six under three operators; Tauranga and Dunedin have one each. That distribution is the practical difference a health policy makes locally: an insurer network that excludes the only private hospital in your city is a much sharper problem than one that excludes one of six, and it is the question worth asking before you buy rather than at the point of claim.

Cities

Where we advise, and the private hospitals in each city
City	Region	Private hospitals	Office
Auckland	Auckland	6	No, advice by phone and video
Christchurch	Canterbury	3	Yes
Wellington	Wellington	4	No, advice by phone and video
Tauranga	Bay of Plenty	1	No, advice by phone and video
Dunedin	Otago	1	No, advice by phone and video
Hamilton	Waikato	3	No, advice by phone and video

Not in one of these? Advice is given nationwide by phone and video and everything on these pages applies wherever you are. The list is six cities because those are the six with enough measured search demand to justify a page worth reading, not because it is where we work.

Where to go next

Explore related pages: Life Insurance, Income Protection, Health Insurance, Trauma Insurance, Calculators.