Agent News

Please take note the upcoming rate changes in various states.

Core States

The following core states have a pending rate change. New rates are not yet available in eLink; however, some renewing policies may be viewable in the renewal index. Please refrain from releasing quotes and renewals for these states until rates are updated.

South Carolina

Effective Nov. 1, 2014, Accident Fund is adopting NCCI’s loss costs in South Carolina with a slight modification to our Loss Cost Multiplier. The overall impact of this change across our book of business is -5.1%. Please note that rates will vary by class. New rates became available in our e-business system on Aug. 18, 2014.

Wisconsin

The Wisconsin Compensation Rating Bureau (WCRB) is implementing a rate change effective Oct. 1, 2014, with an overall rate level increase of 3.19%. These new rates became available in our eLink system on Aug. 18.

Please be sure to discuss pricing options for all new business and renewals with your business development consultant

The Agency Hall of Fame is recognition for those agencies that write the most new business each month. The acknowledgment, given to top agencies in each state, allows us to show appreciation to our agent partners for their efforts.

Arkansas

• JMR PFP Insurance, Fort Smith
• Walker Bros. Insurance, Inc., Springdale

Georgia

• Brown & Brown Insurance of Georgia, Duluth
• Risk Innovations, LLC, Atlanta

Illinois

• Assurance Agency, Ltd, Schaumburg
• Dimond Bros. Insurance LLC, Paris

Indiana

• City Securities Insurance LLC, Crawfordsville
• MBAH Insurance, Lafayette

Iowa

• Holmes, Murphy & Associates, Inc., West Des Moines
• INSPRO, Inc., W Des Moines

Kansas

• Creative Planning Risk Svcs, Leawood
• IMA, Inc., Wichita

Maryland

• Consolidated Insurance Center, Inc., Owings Mills
• Day Deadrick & Marshall, Inc., Beltsville

Michigan

• A. W. Ayres Agency, Inc., Sturgis
• Holbrook Insurance Agency LLC, Southfield

Minnesota

• RJF, A Marsh & McLennan Agency LLC Company, Minneapolis
• The Christensen Group, Inc., Minnetonka

Mississippi

• BancorpSouth Insurance Services Inc, Jackson
• Bottrell Insurance, Jackson

Missouri

• R-T Specialty LLC, Kansas City
• W. E. Walker – Lakenan, LLC, Cape Girardeau

Nebraska

• INSPRO, Inc., Fremont
• The Harry A. Koch Co., Omaha

North Carolina

• Ascension Insurance Agency, Inc., Charlotte
• Insurance Service Center, Apex

South Carolina

• Keenan & Suggs, Inc. – Columbia, Columbia
• Palmetto State Insurance Agency LLC, Lexington

Tennessee

• Athens Insurance Agency, Athens
• Wyatt Insurance Services, Inc., Knoxville

Texas

• MHBT Inc., Dallas
• Swingle Collins & Associates, Dallas

Virginia

• Brown & Brown Insurance Agency of Virginia Inc, Manassas
• Mid Atlantic Insurance Svcs Inc., Richmond

Wisconsin

• Johnson Insurance Services, Inc., Racine
• R & R Insurance Services, Inc. Waukesha, Waukesha

Legislative Update is a brief synopsis of relevant legislative activity currently taking place in Accident Fund core and accommodation states. For more details or further documentation on any of these legislative activities, contact your business development consultant.

With the majority of legislative sessions adjourned for the year, and election day quickly approaching, legislative activity across the nation is minimal. All 435 United States House of Representative seats are up for re-election in November, along with 36 Senate seats – with 21 held by Democrats and 15 held by Republicans. While few political pundits expect the Democrats to take control of the House, the Senate’s balance of power is more tenuous. In order to retake the Senate majority, the GOP needs a net gain of six seats to get to 51, thus avoiding a 50/50 split with Vice President Biden breaking any tie votes and Democrats retaining control.

Federal

Senate Bill 2244, the “Terrorism Risk Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2014,” passed the Senate by a vote of 93-4 in July. This relatively straightforward reauthorization of TRIA would reauthorize the program for seven years and raise the loss threshold at which federal funds would become available from $27.5 billion to $37.5 billion.

The House has yet to pass a bill amid Republican disagreement about how much to trim back the program. House Republican leaders are closing in on a plan to reauthorize a terrorism risk insurance program that would represent a compromise with the already-passed Senate version, but are proceeding quietly amid worries about a potential conservative backlash.

House conservatives, led by Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling of Texas, oppose the Senate approach and say bigger changes are needed to protect taxpayers. They want to raise the “trigger” for the federal re-insurance program to $500 million in damages and make other alterations as reflected in a bill passed by Hensarling’s committee to extend the program for five years.

Recently, AFHI and 408 other organizations joined together with the U.S Chamber of Commerce and sent all members of the U.S. House of Representatives a letter urging the reauthorization of TRIA. Moving forward, AFHI will continue to voice support to Congressional leaders for some form of TRIA reauthorization. We anticipate reauthorization prior expiration on Dec. 31, 2014.

State

Indiana

Indiana House Enrolled Act 1320 (HEA1320) of 2013, creates a Medicare-based hospital fee schedule. Effective July 1, 2014, NCCI estimates the implementation of this act, will result in a -5.2% impact on the overall Indiana workers’ compensation system costs.

AFHI was recently named chair of the Insurance Institute of Indiana’s newly created workers’ compensation work group. The goal of the working group, is to formulate proposals to recommend for inclusion in the institute’s legislative agenda. Over the next few years, we anticipate increased Indiana legislative activity pertaining to the workers’ compensation industry. The creation of this work group indicates the institute’s commitment to further improving the Indiana workers’ compensation system and AFHI intends to take an active role.

Information in this report was sourced from Florida Insurance Council, NAMIC, WorkCompCentral, and NCCI

Disclaimer of Liability

This document is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. This information is subject to change. Every effort is made to provide accurate and complete information in Accident Fund Holding’s Legislative Update. However, Accident Fund Holdings makes no claims, promises or guarantees about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the contents of the Update and expressly disclaims liability for errors and omissions in the contents of this newsletter.

All content within the Legislative Update is the property of Accident Fund Holdings, Inc., unless otherwise stated. All rights are reserved. No part of the Update may be reproduced, transmitted or copied in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of Accident Fund Holdings.

We’re proud to announce that Accident Fund Holdings, Inc. – including Accident Fund and our three related brands (CompWest, Third Coast Underwriters and United Heartland) – has been selected as a Best Place to Work in Insurance for 2014 by Business Insurance.

Accident Fund Holdings and its brands have an excellent reputation for creating a positive workplace culture focused on open communication and a commitment to inclusion and innovation. This environment creates an atmosphere in which people want to work hard and best serve our partner agents and policyholders.

Business Insurance launched the Best Places to Work in Insurance program in 2009 to identify and recognize high-quality workplaces in the commercial insurance industry and honor them for creating workplaces that do a superior job of encouraging employees to thrive in a workplace they can love. The program, and subsequent recognition by Business Insurance and Best Companies Group, an independent workplace excellence research firm, is very prestigious within the insurance industry.

We were excited to see five of our agency partners make the list as well. Congratulations to the following for their Best Places to Work recognition:

• Assurance Agency Ltd. – Schaumburg, IL
• Holmes Murphy & Associates – West Des Moines, IA
• Hylant Group Inc. – Toledo, OH
• J. Smith Lanier & Co. – West Point, GA
• Kapnick Insurance Group – Adrian, MI

We are proud to once again be considered among the Best Places to Work in Insurance and pleased to share this recognition with our agency partners.

As was announced via an Accident Fund Holdings Agent Alert earlier this month, Risk Management Services (RMS) is a new program for customers seeking alternatives to guaranteed cost workers’ compensation plans. RMS offers you, and your customers, an opportunity to work with an experienced partner in risk management to more effectively manage the overall cost of risk.

Risk Management Services, an Accident Fund Holdings initiative, is based at United Heartland’s headquarters in New Berlin, Wis., and led by Tim Greifenkamp. (Read more about Tim here.)

The RMS unit is utilizing United Heartland’s extensive large account experience for the core of its underwriting staff and is currently hiring sales and marketing teams.

Risk Management Services satisfies a need in the marketplace. It provides you, our agents, with a comprehensive product that specifically targets retrospective and large deductible buyers. For additional information, please refer to this downloadable flier. If you have an account that may benefit from Risk Management Services, call 262-787-7900 or email RMS@UnitedHeartland.com.

A reminder that security administrators should periodically review their list of users for Accident Fund’s website. It is the responsibility of our agencies to add, modify and delete users – and it’s extremely important that the list is maintained with accurate information. It should be noted that as long as a user has an active user ID and password, they can access your data from virtually anywhere, even if they’ve left your agency.

It is also a good idea to have a secondary security administrator designated for each agency location in case the primary administrator is out of the office and a change needs to be made. Click here for instructions on how to view and modify your users list.