SYNOPSIS ALL INDUSTRY CONFERENCE CALL January 26, 2011

Money magazine readying cover story aimed at saving readers money on every day expenses, including insurance:

The I.I.I.’s Jeanne Salvatore was interviewed by Money researcher Matt Bushlow and reporter M.P. Dunleavey on a number of occasions regarding ways consumers can reduce their auto and homeowners insurance premiums. 

I.I.I. tells Florida lawmakers that fraud is adding around $1 billion to the costs of Florida’s no-fault auto insurance system:

I.I.I. Florida representative Lynne McChristian’s Wednesday, January 26, presentation to the Florida House Banking and Insurance Committee was summarized in this same-day news release.  In addition, the I.I.I. shared with lawmakers and the media its white paper on no-fault auto trends in Florida, also referenced in the release.

U.S. carriers flew over 10 million flights and carried more than 700 million passengers in 2010 but only 14 people suffered serious injuries and there were no major accidents, according to this front-page story in the Friday, January 21, edition of USA Today. The last fatal commercial aviation accident in the U.S. occurred on February 12, 2009, when a Colgan Air Bombardier Q400 turboprop plunged into a neighborhood near Buffalo, killing 49 people on board and a man on the ground.

Washington, D.C., and Massachusetts are safest places to drive in the U.S., study finds:

Advocates for Auto and Highway Safety issued their annual report card, saying that D.C. and Massachusetts are the safest places in the U.S. for drivers when federal data on traffic fatalities are analyzed to account for population figures and miles driven. This same group found the most hazardous places to drive are Montana, Wyoming, Louisiana and Mississippi, according to a front-page story in the Tuesday, January 25, edition of USA Today. 

The Commission blames severe economic turbulence of 2008 on broad failures in regulation, corporate mismanagement and excessive risk taking among financial firms, according to this front page story in the Wednesday, January 26, edition of The New York Times. The 500-plus page report, to be released later in the week, also criticized the Federal Reserve and other regulators for failing to oversee adequately mortgage lending and the sale of loans and related securities to investors. The commission held 19 days of hearings and interviewed over 700 witnesses. It also plans to publish online transcripts of the hearings and materials gathered as part of the group’s inquiry.

NHTSA administrator David Strickland told The Wall Street Journal in this Wednesday, January 26, article (subscription required) that he wants to concentrate on issues related to new developments in technology, particularly advances that could allow cars to prevent accidents and control driver distraction. Highway fatalities in the U.S. have fallen to their lowest levels in 60 years but 33,000 people died in highway accidents in 2009, the WSJ story notes.

The I.I.I.’s Robert Hartwig spoke on Wednesday, January 26, with Clea Benson, a D.C.-based Bloomberg news wire reporter, about this issue as part of an enterprise story she is preparing on this issue. Benson told the I.I.I. she is familiar with the Reinsurance Association of America’s pro-privatization testimony, which was delivered at the first of FEMA’s two Rethinking the NFIP public hearings in December 2010. The American Insurance Association and the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies also said that the reporter had contacted them on this matter.

Rep. Candice Miller (R-Michigan), a longtime critic of the NFIP, is reportedly on the verge of submitting legislation that would end the federal program. The bill has been given a number (H.R. 435) but the text of the proposed law has not been filed with Congress as yet.

The I.I.I.’s Salvatore has taped an interview and worked extensively with WABC-TV, New York City’s ABC affiliate, for a story they are developing on travel insurance (what it is, how it works). Member companies that have consumers in the NYC area willing to offer on-air interviews about their positive experiences with this product can share their names and contact information with the I.I.I. as WABC-TV is interested in talking to satisfied travel insurance policyholders.

AAA Living magazine readying piece on life insurance beneficiaries who may not be directly related to the policyholder:

Jennifer Chappell Smith, one of this publication’s reporters, sought and received from the I.I.I. a definition of what constitutes an ‘insurable interest’ in a life insurance policy. Her article is pegged to instances in which a policyholder names a niece/nephew as a beneficiary as compared to a daughter/son. 

The I.I.I. placed the issue in its website’s Spotlight because of President Obama’s decision to highlight the issue of “frivolous lawsuits” and how they increase medical malpractice insurance premiums.

The Sacramento, California, City Council approved, on a 5-4 vote during its Tuesday, January 25, session, to levy an ‘accident tax’ on non-city residents who get into accidents within Sacramento’s boundaries. McKinney, Texas, a suburb of Dallas-Fort Worth is looking to do the same thing, according to this front page story in the Friday, January 21, print version of The Dallas Morning News.

Commissioner John Doak, in only his first month in office, is taking heat for a number of personnel moves he has either made, or is considering, according to this Monday, January 24, article in The Daily Oklahoman.

Los Angeles-based Mercury Insurance laid off 165 southern California employees in January, Orange County Register reports:

The job losses came in Mercury’s claims division as well as among some of the company’s administrative staff, this Saturday, January 22, article states.  The piece notes that southern California was hit hard in March 2009 when 363 Mercury employees were let go, with most of them coming from the Brea, California, office.

Percentage of uninsured motorists of Mississippi’s roads remains among the highest in the U.S., Biloxi Sun Herald story says:

More than one in four (28 percent) of Mississippi motorists is driving without auto insurance, this Saturday, January 22, article states, citing Insurance Research Council estimates. The national average of uninsured motorists on the road is about 16 percent.  Mississippi’s uninsured rate puts it among the top five states for drivers not carrying insurance coverage, along with New Mexico, Alabama, Oklahoma and Florida. John Wells, director of property and casualty rating for the Mississippi Insurance Department, said the number of uninsured drivers has not changed much since state legislators approved compulsory auto insurance in 2000 because Mississippi’s laws do not have teeth.

The Clarion Ledger had an Associated Press story in its Tuesday, January 25, edition about how a federal appeals panel is asking the Mississippi Supreme Court whether a state law that limits non-economic (punitive) damages to $1 million in civil cases is constitutional. The question, posed by a three-judge panel of the 5^th US Court of Appeals, came about in a lawsuit filed over a traffic accident involving Lisa Learmonth and the Sears Roebuck Company. Learmonth was awarded $2.2 million in punitive damages after a federal jury trial because of the losses she incurred after an accident with a Sears van. According to the article, the legal question is: can the federally approved non-economic damage payout be reduced to $1 million from $2.2 million because of Mississippi’s state law.

The bill is known as SB7 in the Georgia state Legislature and closely resembles a measure being considered by Montana state lawmakers, according to this Tuesday, January 25, Atlanta Journal-Constitution story.

The Los Angeles Times is changing in ways the paper’s longtime readers are resisting, according to The New York Times:

The NYT’s story appeared on Monday, January 24.

Gordon Stewart, who was president of the I.I.I. for many years before his retirement in December 2006, has launched a news-oriented website to compete with a downstate New York weekly newspaper owned by FNC chairman Roger Ailes and his wife, Elizabeth, who are its publishers, according to a lengthy article in the Monday, January 31, edition of The New Yorker (full text is only available to subscribers).

The South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Julie Patel tweeted about Governor Rick Scott’s press conference, where the governor was asked about the state’s high property insurance rates. Patel subsequently blogged about the start of a debate in Florida’s state Senate regarding property insurance reform legislation.

Karen Clark, who founded Applied Insurance Research, now known as AIR Worldwide, made waves in the blogosphere when she said many insurers priced their property insurance policies in recent years based on what she deemed to have been hyped-up hurricane projections. Clark’s statements generated a written response from RMS, one of the nation’s leading risk modelers.

The I.I.I.’s Wednesday, January 19, media advisory, entitled, “Have Insurance Questions? The Insurance Information Institute Has Answers!” received some significant attention on Twitter this week with about a dozen feeds from different sources tweeting about it. Among these feeds were the Insurance Tips group from California, the NYC Insurance Guide group, and DCG Financial, a financial consulting group in California.

The Los Angeles Times published on Tuesday, January 25, an article on how insurance companies have begun using social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace to investigate suspicious claims. Some insurers, the LA Times reported, look for updates and photos that contradict whatever aliment the person claims to be suffering from, and then use this information on occasion to launch investigations into the legitimacy of their claims.  Other insurers are using online data to help underwrite policies by researching a person’s lifestyle and health, the article states.