BOGUS OPERATOR SHUT DOWN:
An Alexandria, La. man was served with a cease and desist order by Louisiana Department of Insurance Fraud Unit investigators. The order prohibits him from conducting any kind of insurance business in Louisiana. It states that beginning in July 2003, Dereius Djuan Davis, 22, of 4607 Green St., Alexandria, acted as a producer (agent) by selling, soliciting or negotiating insurance for nine different people. He allegedly collected money from each, claiming that he was a legal agent who could obtain insurance for them. However, he misappropriated or otherwise mishandled the money collected, according to investigators. Insurance Com-missioner J. Robert Wooley said "Davis allegedly obtained personal and financial information from people by passing himself off as a legal insurance salesman when he had never been licensed to sell insurance." Wooley added that Davis' "victims learned a hard lesson" by not investigating whether or not Davis was licensed to sell insurance. LDI fraud investigators served Davis in the Rapides Parish jail, where he is incarcerated on unrelated charges. The State Police Fraud Unit had arrested him earlier on charges related to his alleged fraudulent insurance selling activities.
FAIR PLAN SEEKS HIGHER RATES:
The Texas Fair Access to Insurance Requirements (FAIR) Plan Association has requested permission from the Texas Department of Insurance to increase homeowners insurance rates by an average of 12 percent statewide, according to the Property Casualty Insurers Asso-ciation of America (PCI). The Plan was created last year to provide stripped down homeowners coverage for homes that had been rejected by other insurers. According to PCI the request for the rate increase highlights the severity of losses experienced by home insurers in the state. PCI said the Plan is requesting an increase of 22 percent in some instances. The FAIR Plan, launched in January 2003, wrote more than 100,000 policies last year representing around $90 million in premiums. Premiums are expected increase to about $110 million in 2004, based on requested rate increases.
$6M RECOVERED IN OKLAHOMA:
The Oklahoma Department of Insurance recovered more than $6 million in underpaid insurance claims for consumers during 2003. According to Commissioner Carroll Fisher, an estimated 7,000 Oklahomans contacted the department last year for help in dealing with issues resulting from insurance claims. The department's Consumer Assis-tance/Claims Division is responsible for working with consumers to explain insurance laws and to contact companies when it appears a claim may need to be reviewed.
TEXAS COMP COSTS STILL HIGH:
Workers' compensation costs per claim in Texas increased at double-digit rates for the third consecutive year, according to a new study by the Workers Compensation Research Institute. Workers' comp costs per claim remain among the highest of the states in the study. At $5,320, the average cost per claim in Texas is 68 percent above the median of the 12 states in the study. The major drivers behind the increase in overall costs per claim were a growth in medical payments per claim, a rise in indemnity payments per claim (wage replacement payments for lost time injuries) and growth in benefit delivery expenses per claim (largely fueled by medical cost containment expenses). The other states included in the study, CompScope Benchmarks: Multistate Comparisons, 4th Edition, were California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Wisconsin. Texas led the study states in medical costs per claim. At $2,931, medical payments per claim were highest among the 12 states and 21 percent higher than in Illinois, the next highest state. Other WCRI studies identified some of the factors behind higher medical payments—mainly substantially higher than average visits per claim to physicians and chiropractors, compared to physicians and chiropractors in other states. Indemnity payments per claim were also among the highest of the states studied, 28 percent higher than the median state for claims with more than seven days of lost time. The study pointed out that the higher indemnity payments in Texas resulted from a higher percentage of claims with more than seven days of lost time, a higher frequency of claims with PPD or lump-sum payments, and the longest duration (at an average of 18 weeks) of temporary disability among the study states. Average benefit delivery expenses per claim in Texas were 14 percent higher than the 12-state median largely due to higher medical cost containment expenses (claims with more than seven days of lost time).
STUDENTS, DOCS=BAD DRIVERS':
A recent study analyzing the driving records of more than one million Americans revealed students had by far the most reported traffic accidents and speeding citations of any occupation. Medical doctors, attorneys, architects and real estate brokers were right behind students as most likely to be involved in a traffic accident, according to the study, which was conducted by the Quality Planning Corporation. The data was obtained from the driving records of policyholders in every state over a 22-month period in 2001 and 2002. The professions least likely to have accidents were farmers, firemen, pilots and politicians. The top five occupations cited for speeding violations were students, enlisted military, manual laborers, politicians and architects. The least ticketed occupations were homemakers, librarians and law enforcement.
2003 CAT LOSSES TOTAL $12.8B:
U.S. property/casualty insurers paid $12.8 billion to homeowners and businesses for insured property losses from 21 catastrophic events last year, according to current estimates by Insurance Services Office Inc.'s (ISO) Property Claim Services (PCS) unit. Policyholders filed more than 2.6 million personal and commercial property and automobile claims for the year. Though 2003 was the third costliest year for catastrophe losses in the past 10 years—exceeded only by the $28.1 billion loss in 2001 and $17 billion in 1994—the fourth quarter's $2.64 billion loss from five events was the highest during the same period. The quarter's high losses were driven by two California wildfires that caused insured losses of $2.3 billion, in addition to $610 million in losses from three wind and thunderstorm events in 27 states. Catastrophic events during the year affected 39 states. California suffered the highest insured losses at $2.1 billion, followed by Texas at $1.5 billion, Tennessee at $1.2 billion, Oklahoma at $1.1 billion and Virginia at $1 billion.
