Latest Carriers Headlines
All the headlines from our Carriers Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Florida’s Citizens Defends Proposed 11.2% Rate Increase
Oct 8 2012 // Executives of Florida’s state-backed insurer defended a proposed statewide average 11.2 percent increase in homeowners rates as regulators, consumer advocates and other officials questioned the need for the...
Citizens Depopulation and Rates – A Practical Solution
Oct 8 2012 // Today, the homeowners insurance marketplace in Florida is dominated by carriers that were start-ups in the 1990s. Many of them grew by participating in takeout programs initiated to reduce the policy count acquired by the...
Bundlers of Joy: Satisfaction with Home Insurers at 12-Year High
Oct 8 2012 // Overall customer satisfaction with homeowners insurance companies is the highest in the 12 years J.D. Power and Associates has measured it, driven in part by the bundling auto and homeowners policies. Overall satisfaction...
Will Regulatory Reform Trigger Doomsday for Captives?
Oct 8 2012 // If you’re startled by this headline, you’re not alone. Until recently, the words “reform” and “captive” were rarely used in the same sentence. That’s because captive insurance...
3 Reasons Florida Citizens’ Loan Plan Is a Bad Idea
Oct 8 2012 // It has been years since a major hurricane hit Florida, and the good news for Floridians is that property insurers are filing applications to write policies in the state again. But there’s a plan being hatched by the...
Insurer of Home Values Goes Under
Oct 8 2012 // An Ohio court has ordered Home Value Insurance Co. into rehabilitation for inadequate capital and surplus. The rehabilitation order said that HVIC failed to maintain the $5 million minimum capital and surplus that is...
Using Social Media Responsibly
Oct 8 2012 // Social media are changing the way insurance professionals do business. How can these forms of media, such as Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, help make your business more successful? And how can you protect...
Insurer Must Pay Missouri Firm $11M in Supply Chain Interruption Case
Oct 8 2012 // A federal jury in in St. Louis has ordered an insurance company to pay $11 million to a Joplin, Mo., company for damages caused by an oil pipeline leak. TAMKO Building Products Inc. said in a lawsuit that Factory Mutual...
Chairman Nelson Charts Future Course for Lloyd’s
Oct 8 2012 // Lloyd’s of London Chairman John Nelson knew when he acceded to his post one year ago that his predecessor, Lord Peter Levene, would be a hard act to follow. Levene served for nine years and oversaw significant...
Report Points to Insurance Industry’s Vulnerability to Climate Change
Oct 8 2012 // A report out late last month urges the insurance industry to act to protect itself and the community against the increasing frequency of extreme weather due to climate change. In short, the report, its authors and those...
Slow and Steady: Surplus Lines Industry Reverses Downward Trend; Optimism Good for 2012
Oct 8 2012 // Despite catastrophic events in 2011, low investment yields and competitive pressures, surplus lines specialists — especially market leaders — generated healthy operating profits and returns on both revenue and...
Florida’s Take-Out Plan: Citizens Loans to Willing Private Insurers
Oct 8 2012 // Florida’s state-backed property insurer is considering for the first time investing in private insurers to the tune of $350 million, with the hopes these insurers would then take on up to 300,000 of its policies. The...
Md. Consumers Receive $2M in Restitution From Erie Insurance Companies
Oct 5 2012 // Regulators said Maryland consumers received nearly $2 million in refunded premium and interest payments — after an investigation by the Maryland Insurance Administration discovered that two Erie insurance companies...
Florida PIP Reforms Reduce Hikes But Not Many Premiums Thus Far
Oct 5 2012 // Florida regulators are optimistic that the state’s no-fault auto reforms are having a positive effect on the market and will eventually cut premiums for drivers. But for now they are telling the public that the...
Kentucky Recommends Anthem Health Plan as Benchmark for Insurers
Oct 5 2012 // Kentucky has recommended that the Anthem Preferred Provider Organization serve as the benchmark plan for insurers in Kentucky under federal health care reforms. Anthem’s offerings would be the minimum level of...
Calif. State Fund May Recommend Workers’ Comp Rate Drop in Days
Oct 4 2012 // Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of articles to look at California’s workers’ compensation reform law in detail and what must be done to implement that law by Jan. 1, 2013. California’s...
Surplus Lines: Regulators Vetting of Alien Nonadmitted Insurers
Oct 4 2012 // The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) is a non-profit entity that acts as the trade association for state insurance commissioners. Although the NAIC may play a central role in regulation of the...
North Carolina Insurers Seek 17.7% Increase in Homeowners Rates
Oct 4 2012 // North Carolina homeowners could see their first rate increase in four years as the state’s rating bureau called for a statewide average 17.7 percent increase in loss cost rates. The North Carolina Rate Bureau filed...
Florida Approves 10.8% Rate Hike for Citizens; Also 21.4% for Sinkholes
Oct 4 2012 // Florida regulators have approved a 10.8 percent statewide average homeowners insurance rate increase and a 21.4 percent increase in sinkhole rates for the state-backed property insurer. Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty...
P/C Insurers’ Profits Jump in First Half as Catastrophe Losses Drop
Oct 4 2012 // U.S. property/casualty insurers’ net income after taxes jumped to $16.4 billion in first-half 2012 from $4.8 billion in first-half 2011, with insurers’ overall profitability as measured by their annualized rate...
