Posted by Benji Riggins on April 30, 2010 under Insurance News | 
Nearly 30 percent of people have cleaned up their social networking profiles for job interviews, and the economic downturn has made them more cautious about postings on social media sites.
A new telephone survey sponsored by the Chubb Group of Insurance Companies reveals that more than one in four (27 percent) individuals say they have posted a comment on a news site or blog. One third of 18- to 34-year-olds have posted a comment on news sites or blogs. And 37 percent of those respondents making $100,000 or more have posted a comment.
The survey, which polled 1,000 Americans, shows that while some people are being cautious about putting personal information online, many are unaware of the liability exposures associated with posting comments to blogs or other Internet sites.
“A foolish post or a tweet could cost you a job or even trigger a libel lawsuit,” says Christie Alderman, vice president of Chubb & Son and new product and services manager with Chubb Personal Insurance. “We all should think twice before posting any comment online.”
The survey also asked respondents about obtaining permission to share copyrighted online materials. Sixty percent of respondents said they rarely or never obtain permission to cut and paste articles, other information or artwork from copyrighted Web sites before e-mailing them or printing them out and distributing them to others. One in four (25 percent) respondents said they always obtain permission.
Only 2 percent of respondents said they have lawyers review comments before posting them to their blogs.
“This raises significant risk issues for the owner of the blog,” says Alderman. “There are different schools of thought with regard to allowing comments to be posted directly to the site versus reviewing comments before they are posted. The safest and most conservative approach is to require pre-registration before allowing comments and to preview the comments before they appear online. This may not be practical for everyone, but there are other ways to protect yourself.”
Forty-five percent of the respondents were members of one of the following social networking sites: Facebook (37 percent), MySpace (19 percent), LinkedIn (9 percent) and Twitter (6 percent). Nearly 60 percent of respondents earning $100,000 or more belonged to one of these sites.
The telephone survey was conducted by Opinion Research Corp.
Source: Chubb Group of Insurance Cos
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 26, 2010 under Boat Insurance |
In order to obtain the best possible insurance coverage for your particular watercraft consider taking the following steps.
Research a number of insurance companies, as well as a variety of policies on the internet. This will help you to determine which features you would like to have written into your policy, and which ones you may not feel as strongly about.
After investigating as many companies as you can, select 3 or 4 which offer the most extensive packages. Be certain that each company will be able to meet or exceed your insurance needs by viewing their policy options. When selecting these companies also consider which ones have the most experience in dealing with the type of insurance you want. Boat owners should consider choosing companies which specialize in boating insurance, rather than other types of insurance.
Get at least 3 quotes. These can be obtained online, or by contacting a representative from each company, to explain what you want, and request a quote. Obtaining a quote does not obligate you to purchase the insurance. If you are not satisfied with the coverage offered, or the rates quoted, then you can simply say “No thank you.”
Don’t be pressured into selecting a policy, until you feel confident that you have found the right one. Before you purchase any policy take the time to talk with a representative of the insurance company. Evaluate the service that representative provides. If you do not feel comfortable with one company, consider looking into another. It will be important in the future, should you need to file a claim, that you feel confident that the representative will be attentive to you as a customer.
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 23, 2010 under Claims |
Low reimbursements from public health insurance programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, have prompted hospitals to shift costs to automobile insurance companies—raising auto injury claim costs and forcing auto insurers to more closely scrutinize and negotiate hospital bills prior to payment.
A new study from the Insurance Research Council (IRC) estimates that for bodily injury (BI) liability claims in 38 tort and add-on states, cost shifting in 2007 resulted in $1.2 billion in excess hospital charges.
However, the study says, the full impact of hospital cost shifting, including that occurring in other insurance coverages and in other states, is likely much greater.
“The conventional wisdom is that hospitals aggressively seek to shift costs from public insurance programs to private payers such as auto insurance companies,” said Elizabeth Sprinkel, senior vice president of the IRC. “With this study, we now have information on the magnitude of cost shifting and a better understanding of the need for supportive state laws and effective tools that will enable auto insurers to pay hospitals appropriately and help control auto injury claim costs.”
Spronkel said hospital cost shifting to auto injury claims illustrates the complex relationship between property/casualty insurance and the broader healthcare and insurance system.
“Healthcare legislation enacted by Congress last month underscores the complexity of this relationship,” said Sprinkel. “It will take months, if not years, to understand the full impact of the reforms on hospital cost shifting and the auto insurance system.”
To explore the relationship between key health system features and auto injury hospital costs, IRC developed a statistical model of average hospital charges for auto injury claims in different states. Key predictors of average hospital charges confirmed by the model are the percentage of a state’s population without health insurance coverage and the percentage of the population covered by Medicaid.
To estimate excess hospital charges due to hospital cost shifting, IRC compared average hospital charges for BI liability claims in Maryland with average charges in 38 other tort and add-on states. In the 1970s, Maryland received a waiver from the federal government allowing it to regulate hospital reimbursement rates for all purchasers of hospital services. As a result, virtually all hospital cost shifting in the state was eliminated. IRC said that Maryland’s unique approach to hospital reimbursement, while unlikely to be replicated in other states, provided an opportunity to examine costs in an environment with minimal cost shifting.
In all instances, IRC found that average hospital charges for auto injury claims in Maryland were substantially lower than hospital charges in most other states.
IRC also found that the costs of expensive diagnostic procedures performed in Maryland hospitals were much lower than in other states but were more similar to costs in other states when the procedures were performed outside a hospital.
The IRC study, Hospital Cost Shifting and Auto Injury Insurance Claims, is based on data from more than 42,000 auto injury claims closed with payment under the five principal private passenger coverages. Twenty-two insurers, representing 58 percent of the private passenger auto insurance market in the Unites Sates in 2006, participated in the study.
Source: IRC
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 19, 2010 under Safety |
The 2010 Atlantic hurricane season will produce an above-average eight hurricanes, four of them major, posing a heightened threat to the U.S. coastline, the Colorado State University hurricane forecasting team predicted Wednesday.
In its second forecast in four months for the 2010 season, the leading storm research team founded by hurricane forecast pioneer William Gray said the six-month season beginning on June 1 would likely see 15 named tropical storms.
The team forecast a 69 percent chance of at least one major hurricane making landfall on the U.S. coastline in 2010, compared with a long-term average probability of 52 percent.
Major hurricanes pack powerful sustained winds of at least 111 miles per hour .
For the Gulf Coast, from the Florida Panhandle west to Brownsville, Texas, including the Gulf of Mexico oil patch, the probability of a major hurricane making landfall was seen at 44 percent versus a long-term average of 30 percent, the Colorado State University team said.
“While patterns may change before the start of the hurricane season, we believe current conditions warrant concern for an above-average season,” Gray said in a statement.
An average Atlantic season has about 10 tropical storms, of which six become hurricanes.
The Colorado State University team also predicted a 58 percent chance of a major hurricane tracking into the Caribbean, where Haiti is vulnerable after a devastating Jan. 12 earthquake that left more than a million people homeless.
Extreme Season Feared
The earlier forecast in December by Gray’s team had already predicted an “above-average” season producing 11 to 16 tropical storms, including six to eight hurricanes. It had said three to five of next year’s storms would become “major” hurricanes of Category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson intensity scale.
Another forecaster, AccuWeather.com, last month also forecast a potentially “extreme” hurricane season this year, with “above-normal threats” to the U.S. coastline.
AccuWeather said five hurricanes, two or three of them major, were expected to strike the U.S. coast, forming out of an expected 16 to 18 tropical storms, almost all of them in the western Atlantic or Gulf of Mexico.
The 2009 season ended Nov. 30 had only nine storms, including three hurricanes, and was the quietest since 1997 due in part to El Nino, the eastern Pacific warm water phenomenon that tends to suppress Atlantic hurricanes.
But Phil Klotzbach, lead forecaster with the Colorado State team — whose research is followed closely by energy and commodity markets — said El Nino was expected to dissipate fully by the start of this year’s storm season.
“The dissipating El Nino, along with the expected anomalously warm Atlantic ocean sea surface temperatures, will lead to favorable dynamic and thermodynamic conditions for hurricane formation and intensification,” said Klotzbach.
The Colorado State University team has repeatedly cautioned that extended-range forecasts for hurricane activity are imprecise and can often miss the mark.
The university team originally expected the 2009 season to produce 14 tropical cyclones, of which seven would become hurricanes. But the season, which ended on Nov. 30 and was the quietest since 1997, had only nine storms, including three hurricanes.
By Pascal Fletcher
April 8, 2010
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 16, 2010 under Flood |
Congress Thursday voted to restore jobless benefits for hundreds of thousands of Americans who had lost them during a partisan standoff in the Senate over spending.
[The bill also reauthorizes the federal flood insurance program until the end of May and restores federal COBRA health insurance subsidies.]
The House of Representatives voted 289-112 to restore the lapsed programs and sent the measure to President Barack Obama, who signed it into law. The Senate had approved it earlier in the day after weeks of delay.
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With the unemployment rate at 9.7 percent, some 6.1 million Americans rely on jobless benefits. Those benefits, which average roughly $300 a week, expired for more than 200,000 Americans on April 5 after Republican Senator Tom Coburn blocked a vote shortly before Congress left town on a two-week break.
The standoff also has disrupted a federal flood insurance program, which has held up 1,400 home sales each day in flood-prone areas and slashed emergency loans to small businesses, Democrats said.
COBRA health insurance subsidies for the unemployed and payments to doctors under the Medicare health program have also been disrupted.
[The provision reauthorizing the federal flood insurance program is effective retroactively to Feb. 28 and extends the program until May 31, 2010, the day before the new hurricane season officially starts.
The Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America (Big "I") said it is concerned that Congress has only extended the program for a brief period again.
"It is alarming that the NFIP was allowed to expire, causing so much confusion and potentially leaving desperate homeowners and small businesses unprotected for more than two weeks," said Robert Rusbuldt, Big "I" president and CEO. "The Big 'I' is greatly concerned that these short expiration periods, coupled with the uncertainty of temporary extensions, will negatively impact the market."
Since the extension is retroactive, any new policy applications or renewals that were signed and submitted during the hiatus will be effective from the date of application or, in the case of waiting periods, the waiting period will start from the date of application, according to the agents' group.
"This series of temporary extensions, last minute actions and service lapses during such a delicate period in our economy is of great concern to our agents, homeowners and small businesses," said Charles Symington, Big "I" senior vice president of government affairs. "Though we are grateful that Congress extended this program, we are increasingly frustrated by these repeated one-month extensions and the periods of expiration that sometimes result from them."]
REPUBLICAN OBJECTIONS
Coburn and other Republicans argued that Congress should find a way to pay for the unemployment benefits program rather than letting it add to a budget deficit that could hit a record $1.5 trillion this fiscal year.
“Our debt and deficits are as much of an emergency as unemployment, yet Congress continues to pretend it can spend and borrow without restraint,” Coburn said in a statement.
The Senate voted down Coburn’s proposal to redirect $20 billion from other government programs.
Democrats said jobless aid had always been considered emergency spending during times of high unemployment.
Three Senate Republicans — Susan Collins and Olympia Snow of Maine and Ohio’s George Voinovich– voted for the bill. In the House, Republicans were divided, with 49 voting for the bill and 112 voting against it.
Jobless benefits normally expire after six months, but Congress has extended the program several times during a slump marked by high levels of long-term joblessness.
Obama said he was “grateful” that Congress had moved forward on the temporary extension but urged lawmakers to extend the benefits further.
“As I requested in my budget, I urge Congress to move quickly to extend these benefits through the end of this year,” Obama said in a statement.
“I also urge Congress to move forward on legislation to help small businesses grow and hire and other measures to increase the pace of job growth,” he said. “This is my top priority, and I will fight day and night until every American who wants a good job has one.
The bill passed by the Senate would extend benefits through June 2 and apply retroactively to those cut off last week. It would cost $18.2 billion, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
Democrats have been extending the program on a month-to-month basis as they work on a longer-term fix.
That has given Senate Republicans plenty of opportunity for disruption.
Republican objections forced the Senate to spend most of the week on a measure that had been handled on a routine basis in the House. Democrats can expect to face similar delays on other spending measures that are not offset with spending cuts elsewhere, Coburn said.
REGULAR DEBATE TOPIC
The debate over spending is likely to resurface on a regular basis as the November congressional elections approach.
Republicans have pointed to record deficits and last year’s $863 billion economic stimulus package to paint Democrats as reckless spenders unconcerned with the country’s mounting debt.
Democrats say the country’s dire fiscal situation can be traced in large part to tax cuts, wars and an expansion of Medicare that were enacted when Republicans were in control.
“Those who talk about balancing budgets who have not balanced them in the past should not be trying to do so on the backs of hundreds of thousands of unemployed in our beloved country,” said Democratic Representative Sander Levin, who chairs the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.
(Additional reporting by Deborah Charles; Editing by Eric Walsh and Peter Cooney)
By Andy Sullivan
April 15, 2010
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 15, 2010 under Motorcycle Insurance |
The number of motorcycle sales dropped in 2009 and so did the number of motorcycle thefts.
The latest report from the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) shows that motorcycle thefts declined by 13 percent in 2009, continuing a downward trend in thefts. A total of 56,093 motorcycles were reported stolen to law enforcement in 2009, down from 64,492 reported in 2008.
While overall thefts of passenger vehicles and light trucks are down, so are vehicle sales. Motorcycle sales between 2008 and 2009 were down 40.8 percent, according to the Motorcycle Industry Council. The Japanese Automobile Manufacturers Association also reported a 47.4 percent decrease in motorcycle production in 2009 from 2008 figures.
The top five motorcycles stolen last year were: (1) Honda, 13,688; (2) Yamaha, 11,148; (3) Suzuki, 9,154; (4) Kawasaki, 5,911; and (5) Harley-Davidson, 3,529. Combined they accounted for 43,430 thefts, or 77.4 percent of the total.
The top five states with the most motorcycle theft activity were: (1) California, 6,273; (2) Texas, 5,526; (3) Florida, 5,009; (4) North Carolina, 3,045; and (5) Georgia, 2,067. These five states accounted for 21,920 thefts, or 39 percent of the total.
The summer months of July (6,319); August (6,079); and June (5,672) saw the most theft activity while the fewest thefts were recorded during the winter months of December (2,927); February (3,100); and January (3,570).
To view the complete motorcycle theft report, visit: www.nicb.org.
Source: National Insurance Crime Bureau
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 12, 2010 under Insurance News |
North Carolina drivers pay an average of $591.11 each year for auto insurance, the eighth-lowest rate in the country and the lowest in the South.
North Dakota has the nation’s lowest insurance cost, at $511.79 per year, according to a report from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Iowa was second at $517.62 per year, according to the study, which looked at payment levels for all 50 states from 2003 to 2007.
North Carolina is one of the only states to negotiate standardized, across-the-board rates for all companies, depending on territory. The rate set by the insurance commissioner is the cap, and companies writing traditional policies can deviate from that rate only by offering discounts.
Here are the report’s rankings for neighboring states:
•Tennessee: No. 14, at $649.22 annually.
•Virginia: No. 17, at $660.80.
•South Carolina: No. 30, at $761.81.
•Georgia: No. 31, at $781.92.
Charlotte Business Journal – by Lee Weisbecker Triangle Business Journal
Posted by Benji Riggins on April 8, 2010 under Interesting Info |
North Carolina’s big-city motorists are losing nearly on average the cost of a tank of gas every week to pay for their troubles from pot holes, longer waits in traffic and perilous roads.
A national transportation group released a report this week estimating a driver in North Carolina’s two largest urban areas loses $1,350 a year because of lost time and gasoline costs sitting in traffic, car repairs and accidents where roadway design likely contributed to a wreck.
The study by the Washington-based nonprofit group TRIP, based largely on federal highway and traffic safety data, may reinvigorate the discussion state transportation boosters want to persuade the Legislature to approve new ways to raise road construction funds.
The state estimated years ago it had a $65 billion funding gap through 2030 between projected transportation needs and the current funding sources to pay for them.
“North Carolina is falling behind in maintaining its major roads, bridges and highways and the state lacks adequate funding with numerous projects that would greatly enhance economic development in the state,” TRIP executive director Will Wilkins said.
The $838 million in federal stimulus money for ready-to-build roads and bridges only provides short-term assistance for North Carolina, where population is expected to grow by one-third to 12 million and vehicle travel by 45 percent by 2030.
“The bottom line is our needs are growing in North Carolina. Our revenue stream is not,” state Transportation Secretary Gene Conti said at a Raleigh news conference where he agreed with the findings. “We need to continue to work hard and do more with less, but I don’t think at the end of the day that’s going to get the job done.”
The group TRIP said the costs above and beyond normal driving and maintenance for Charlotte drivers ($1,351 a year) and Raleigh-Durham ($1,350) area drivers are essentially the same, while drivers in Greensboro and Winston-Salem on average face $901 in expenses because there’s less congestion in the Triad.
Statewide, congested and deteriorating roads and those that lack improved safety features cost drivers $5.7 billion, according to the TRIP report. North Carolina has the second largest state-maintained highway system but ranks fourth-lowest in the nation for per-mile capital spending on those roads.
There are more than six million drivers in North Carolina. Wilkins discouraged calculating a statewide driver average because congestion figures were available only in the three metro areas.
Charlotte-area motorists spend 40 hours a year in traffic, compared to 25 hours in 1997. The average rush-hour trip is now 25 percent longer in Charlotte and 17 percent longer in the Raleigh-Durham area compared to a non-rush hour trip, the report said.
The calculation of the three regions is based on the per-driver cost for congestion, additional vehicle costs for driving on poor or mediocre roads and the economic costs of accidents.
A state blue-ribbon transportation commission recommended in 2008 raising the tax on car sales, raising vehicle registration fees and even charging motorists for every mile recorded on a vehicle’s odometer as a way to make up for a state gasoline tax eroding as people drive less and with more fuel-efficient cars.
Lawmakers approved last year the commission’s idea to expand to all 100 counties the option to raise local sales taxes for public transportation projects, but otherwise the “Legislature hasn’t really had the courage to enact many of these suggestions,” said Tom Crosby with the AAA Carolinas Motor Club.
Wilkins urged Congress to reauthorize the law setting out federal transportation funding to provide more road-funding stability, since federal revenues pay for about one-fourth of North Carolina’s road projects.
By Gary D. Robertson
March 26, 2010
