By Rebecca Styles
Research Lead | Hautū Rangahau
When it comes to its customer satisfaction ratings, nib may need a check-up – the health insurer earned our 2026 “Sick of It” Yeah, Nah Award.
We routinely calculate customer satisfaction scores for providers and products, by subtracting the percentage of unhappy customers from the percentage of happy ones. When it came to nib, the resulting score was just 1.
Other health insurers scored much higher. AA Insurance, for example, came in at +71, while the largest insurer, Southern Cross, scored +69.
How the rest stacked up
When we looked across all service satisfaction scores, we found that even the businesses with the unhappiest customers in other sectors scored much higher than nib.
Even our next lowest entry for all providers (not just health insurers), Chubb/ANZ life insurance, scored substantially higher, with a net satisfaction score of +27.
Insurer AMI scored +42 and +48 for its house and contents insurance respectively, while power company Ecotricity came in at +54.
Mobile service provider Spark came in at +72, while internet provider Slingshot scored +62.
The lowest net satisfaction score in each service sector we monitor
Source: Consumer NZ satisfaction surveys, 2025–2026. Online surveys of Consumer NZ members and supporters and nationally representative samples recruited via Dynata. Results shown are based on respondents who identified each company or product as their provider. Sample sizes vary by survey and brand. Net satisfaction = % satisfied minus % dissatisfied, ranked from lowest to highest net satisfaction.
Why did nib get such a low score?
Over the past three years, 36% of nib’s survey respondents had a problem with the provider. This was the highest dissatisfaction rate any health insurer earnt in our survey.
One of the main bugbears customers had was the cost: 61% were unhappy with nib’s prices, while 52% said they didn’t feel they were getting value for money.
Health insurance premiums have been on the rise across the board, but nib had the largest increase of any provider in Consumer NZ’s most recent survey of comprehensive health insurance policies – its Ultimate Health Max premium went up 36% between 2023 and 2025. The next largest increase was 32%, at UniMed.
While survey respondents expressed dissatisfaction with other insurers’ value for money, nib’s score outstrips those for other providers. For example, only 13% of respondents were dissatisfied with the price at AA Insurance.
nib’s customers were also unhappy with the company’s lack of clarity as to policy cover and exclusions, lack of communication and unsatisfying customer service.
Yeah, Nah Awards
Our Yeah, Nah Awards highlight the worst of the worst in business to pressure poor-performing companies to up their game.
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