IFRS 17 Insurance Contracts Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Insurance Finance Managers, Financial Reporting Managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-BI-067

Before you join: Participants should understand financial statements, accrual accounting and core insurance concepts such as premiums, claims, reserves and reinsurance.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

IFRS 17 changes how insurers measure, present and explain insurance contract results. It replaces many local accounting approaches with a model that separates insurance service results from finance income or expenses, introduces the contractual service margin (CSM), and requires more detailed disclosures. Finance teams must translate actuarial cash-flow information into controlled accounting entries, explain movements to management and auditors, and maintain consistent reporting across portfolios, entities and reporting periods.

This course explains the IFRS 17 requirements from contract scoping through transition and financial statement disclosure. Participants examine the General Measurement Model, Premium Allocation Approach and Variable Fee Approach; identify portfolios, groups and annual cohorts; calculate fulfilment cash flows, risk adjustment and CSM; and account for insurance acquisition cash flows, onerous groups, reinsurance contracts held and contract modifications. The course also addresses presentation, disclosure, journal entries, close processes, controls and links with IFRS 9 financial instruments.

Instruction combines focused technical briefings with insurer reporting cases, calculation walkthroughs, group analysis and facilitated discussions of accounting-policy choices. Participants work through realistic life, general insurance and reinsurance scenarios, using reporting extracts and movement analyses. They leave with an IFRS 17 implementation and reporting toolkit containing calculation models, accounting-policy decision aids, close checklists and disclosure planning materials that can be adapted to their own reporting responsibilities.

The course is suited to finance, actuarial, risk, reporting, audit and transformation professionals working for insurers, reinsurers, bancassurers and insurance groups. It is particularly relevant where teams need to review IFRS 17 results, challenge assumptions, prepare disclosures or strengthen the finance-actuarial reporting process.

What you will be able to do

  • Apply IFRS 17 scope, contract boundary and unit-of-account requirements to insurance arrangements
  • Select the General Measurement Model, Premium Allocation Approach or Variable Fee Approach
  • Calculate fulfilment cash flows, risk adjustment and contractual service margin movements
  • Prepare IFRS 17 journal entries for initial recognition, subsequent measurement and derecognition
  • Analyse onerous groups, loss components and insurance acquisition cash-flow recoverability
  • Account for reinsurance contracts held and explain their differing measurement requirements
  • Produce IFRS 17 statement presentation, disclosure reconciliations and key quantitative analyses
  • Develop an IFRS 17 reporting close plan with finance-actuarial controls and ownership

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Explain CSM, risk adjustment and fulfilment cash-flow movements to senior stakeholders
  • Review actuarial inputs using IFRS 17 accounting requirements and documented assumptions
  • Prepare clearer IFRS 17 close reconciliations, journals and financial statement support
  • Identify accounting-policy decisions affecting profit emergence and key performance measures
  • Contribute confidently to auditor discussions on transition, disclosures and control evidence

For your organisation

  • Improve consistency between actuarial valuations, finance postings and published IFRS 17 results
  • Reduce close-period rework through defined reconciliations, roles and review controls
  • Strengthen evidence for external audit of assumptions, CSM movements and disclosures
  • Improve management explanations of insurance service results and finance-result volatility
  • Support accurate transition adjustments and repeatable reporting across insurance portfolios

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can determine whether arrangements fall within IFRS 17 and identify the relevant accounting unit.

  • IFRS 17 objective, effective requirements and relationship with IFRS 9
  • Insurance risk, significant risk transfer and contracts within scope
  • Fixed-fee service contracts assessed under IFRS 15 scope exception
  • Investment contracts with discretionary participation features and IFRS 17 eligibility
  • Separating distinct investment, goods and service components from insurance contracts
  • Contract boundary assessment using substantive rights, obligations and repricing capability

Participants can establish portfolios and groups that meet IFRS 17 aggregation requirements.

  • Portfolios defined by similar risks managed together under IFRS 17
  • Profitability groups identify onerous, profitable and no-significant-risk contracts
  • Annual cohort requirement and permitted exceptions for intergenerationally shared risks
  • Recognition dates for issued contracts, onerous groups and coverage commencement
  • Evidence required to support profitability assessments at initial recognition
  • Group-level measurement consequences for profit recognition and loss component tracking

Participants can calculate the fulfilment cash flows used in the General Measurement Model.

  • Fulfilment cash flows combine estimates, discounting and non-financial risk adjustment
  • Probability-weighted cash-flow estimates reflect unbiased expected present value principles
  • Cash-flow inclusion follows contract boundaries and directly attributable activities
  • Discount rates reflect timing, currency, liquidity and financial risks
  • Top-down and bottom-up discount-rate approaches compared for insurance liabilities
  • Risk adjustment methods include confidence level, cost-of-capital and value-at-risk
  • Assumption governance documents source data, methodology, approval and change rationale

Participants can measure the contractual service margin and recognise initial losses correctly.

  • Initial measurement combines fulfilment cash flows and contractual service margin
  • CSM prevents recognition of unearned profit at group inception
  • Onerous groups recognise immediate loss through insurance service expense
  • Loss component records future reversal of initial and subsequent losses
  • Insurance acquisition cash flows allocated to expected contract renewals
  • Coverage units determine systematic CSM release for insurance services
  • Journal entries distinguish liability for remaining coverage and incurred claims

Participants can analyse subsequent measurement changes and explain insurance service results.

  • CSM accretes interest using locked-in discount rates under GMM
  • Future-service assumption changes adjust CSM unless groups are onerous
  • Current-service changes affect insurance revenue and insurance service expense
  • Past-service cash-flow changes flow directly through profit or loss
  • Coverage-unit allocation releases CSM according to quantity and duration
  • Loss-component reversals allocate favourable changes between CSM and profit
  • Roll-forward reconciliations explain opening balances, movements and closing balances

Participants can determine and apply the simplified and direct-participation measurement models.

  • PAA eligibility tested using one-year coverage or materiality criteria
  • Liability for remaining coverage measured using premium receipts and acquisition costs
  • PAA onerous-contract testing identifies facts requiring additional loss assessment
  • Incurred claims liability under PAA uses fulfilment cash-flow measurement
  • Direct participation features determine eligibility for the Variable Fee Approach
  • Variable fee represents entity share of underlying item fair-value returns
  • VFA CSM adjustments reflect financial changes affecting future service

Participants can account for reinsurance held and related acquisition cash flows under IFRS 17.

  • Reinsurance held measured separately from underlying insurance contracts issued
  • Recognition timing differs for proportionate and non-proportionate reinsurance coverage
  • Net cost or net gain creates reinsurance contractual service margin
  • Recovery of underlying onerous losses recognised under specified conditions
  • Reinsurance cash flows include premiums, recoveries, commissions and profit-sharing amounts
  • Acquisition cash-flow assets tested for recoverability and impairment indicators
  • Presentation separates reinsurance service result from insurance service result

Participants can prepare IFRS 17 presentation and disclosures that explain reported performance.

  • Statement of financial position separates issued and held contract assets
  • Insurance revenue excludes investment components and reflects service transfer
  • Insurance service expenses include incurred claims and attributable expenses
  • Insurance finance income or expenses presented in profit or loss
  • OCI accounting-policy choice addresses discount-rate movement volatility
  • Disclosure reconciliations explain net carrying amounts by measurement component
  • Judgements, methods and risk exposures require entity-specific narrative disclosures

Participants can assess transition methods and prepare evidence for opening IFRS 17 balances.

  • Transition date, date of initial application and comparative reporting requirements
  • Full retrospective approach applies IFRS 17 as if always effective
  • Modified retrospective approach uses permitted simplifications when data are unavailable
  • Fair value approach derives CSM from transition-date fair value
  • Transition-method selection documented by group, portfolio and evidence availability
  • Opening equity effects include retained earnings and accumulated other comprehensive income
  • Transition disclosures explain methods, practical expedients and material opening-balance effects

Participants can design a controlled IFRS 17 reporting process and targeted improvement plan.

  • Finance-actuarial data lineage traces assumptions through journals and disclosures
  • Close calendar assigns calculation, review, posting and approval responsibilities
  • Key controls address model changes, interfaces, reconciliations and manual adjustments
  • CSM movement analysis links actuarial output to general-ledger balances
  • Materiality thresholds guide investigation of unexpected result movements
  • Audit evidence includes methodologies, governance records and reconciled source data
  • Application plan prioritises reporting gaps, owners, milestones and control improvements

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. IFRS 17 scope and grouping decision checklist
  2. Fulfilment cash-flow and CSM roll-forward model
  3. Measurement-model selection decision tree
  4. IFRS 17 journal-entry and reconciliation template
  5. Financial statement disclosure planning checklist
  6. IFRS 17 close-control and application plan

Who should attend

  • Insurance Finance Managers — responsible for IFRS 17 close, analysis and reporting decisions
  • Financial Reporting Managers — preparing insurer financial statements and note disclosures
  • Actuaries — supplying cash-flow, risk adjustment and CSM inputs to finance
  • Insurance Accountants — posting IFRS 17 entries and reconciling reporting movements
  • Internal Auditors — testing IFRS 17 controls, data lineage and management review
  • Finance Transformation Leads — coordinating process, system and governance changes

Skills and tools covered

IFRS 17 measurementCSM roll-forward analysisInsurance contract groupingFinancial statement disclosuresReinsurance accountingReporting close controls

Tools and standards

IFRS 17 Insurance Contracts, IFRS 9 Financial Instruments, IAS 1 Presentation of Financial Statements, IAS 12 Income Taxes

How the course runs

Training methodology

The instructor uses short technical briefings to establish each IFRS 17 requirement, followed by worked insurer cases and guided calculation reviews. Small groups analyse contract features, select measurement models, trace CSM and loss-component movements, and prepare reporting outputs from case data. Discussions focus on accounting-policy choices, finance-actuarial handoffs and audit evidence. A final application-planning session helps participants adapt the course templates to their own close calendar, data sources, controls and disclosure responsibilities.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should understand financial statements, accrual accounting and core insurance concepts such as premiums, claims, reserves and reinsurance. Experience in insurer finance, actuarial reporting, audit or financial reporting is expected. Familiarity with IAS 1, IFRS 9 and IAS 12 is helpful but not essential. The course assumes no prior detailed study of IFRS 17 and does not require actuarial qualifications, programming skills or prior use of a specialist IFRS 17 calculation engine. Participants should be comfortable reading accounting standards and interpreting numerical reconciliations.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You should understand financial statements, accrual accounting and basic insurance terms such as premium, claim and reinsurance. Prior IFRS 17 study is not required, and actuarial qualification is not expected.

Bring a calculator and, if permitted by your employer, examples of your reporting questions or anonymised policy issues. Course materials and case data are provided.

It is designed for insurer finance, reporting, accounting, actuarial, audit and transformation professionals. It also suits managers who review IFRS 17 results without producing every calculation.

This course focuses on accounting for insurance contracts under IFRS 17, including CSM, risk adjustment, insurance revenue and reinsurance held. IFRS 9 is addressed only where classification, presentation or finance-result interactions matter.

Participants can use the decision aids, roll-forward model, close checklist and disclosure materials when reviewing their own contract groups and reporting outputs. The course also clarifies questions to raise with actuaries, systems teams, auditors and policy owners.

The course runs from 08:30 to 16:30 each day, providing about 6.5 contact hours daily. Time is divided among technical instruction, worked cases, group analysis, calculation reviews and reporting-process planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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