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NCDOI is asking our help to oppose SB490, HB834 and SB477 June 2011 Below is a portion of a letter to Jim Kennedy our EVP from Rose Vaughn Williams: "Sen. Rucho’s bill is SB 490. It would get rid of the Rate Bureau to set auto insurance rates and it would get rid of the SDIP system (the Safe Driver Incentive System). The SDIP is the system that the sets out in statute the amount insurance companies can raise their rates based on tickets or wrecks. This bill would allow the auto insurance companies to decide how much a ticket or wreck should cause rates to go up and the bill would allow the insurance companies to increase rates even if you have no tickets or convictions. It would also allow the auto insurance companies to raise rates up to 15% per year “in the aggregate” with no review or approval by the Commissioner. “In the aggregate” means that some people could see an increase of more than 15% per year. Sen. Rucho’s bill is pushed by State Farm insurance company. It is not supported by the majority of auto insurance companies. We believe it would not be good for NC drivers. NC has low auto insurance rates and these mostly out of state companies are making a good profit on NC citizens. The other bill pending in the Senate is Sen. Apodaca’s bill, SB 477 (same as House Bill 834, sponsored by Rep. Johnathan Rhyne). That bill would not get rid of the Rate Bureau for auto insurance rates, but it would allow the companies to increase auto insurance rates on drivers even if they have no tickets or convictions. In addition, it would allow increases “up to the facility rate” without having to get approval from the Commissioner. Right now “the facility rate” is over 19% ABOVE the very cap on the rate set by the Commissioner. In the Fall that amount is set to go up to almost 30%. This bill is opposed by Nationwide Insurance and our domestic companies (except for Farm Bureau which is a National Brand following a national agenda). The Commissioner opposes both bills. The auto insurance company lobbyists push these bills by saying that they are going to get rid of a “surcharge” good drivers pay for bad drivers. That surcharge is about $13-17 per YEAR. In return for getting rid of this surcharge, both bills would give the auto insurance companies the right to raise rates on NC drivers even if they have a clean record and without any approval by the Commissioner. “Trust us”, they say. We won’t charge too much…The N&O editorial quote said the companies are saying “Oh heavens to Betsy, we won’t raise rates!” This is not a good bargain for NC drivers. Other states that have laws like that have….higher rates. The other argument the insurance company lobbyists use is to say North Carolina’s Reinsurance Facility is too large and has more drivers in it than any other state. All states have some sort of sub-standard or non-standard market. NC just uses a Reinsurance Facility model. That is why other states have few in their “reinsurance facility”. The other states have a non-standard market. South Carolina, which is the state the companies always speak of so highly has a non-standard market that is about the same percentage of drivers as ours, and… South Carolina has higher rates than NC. Auto insurance companies already have all the authority they need to give people discounts. These bills give them the right to charge people more. These bills would lead to a huge change in rates in North Carolina. People are going to be stunned when they started seeing increases on their bills and yet have no tickets. We know that 770,000 people will see an increase and those are just folks in the facility. The change will affect all drivers. We do not believe that there is a problem to fix and …the “fix” the companies propose is going to hurt NC drivers who are struggling to pay even a few more dollars a gallon for gas. Will the companies overcharge? The last refund the Commissioner had to order was 50 million dollars….. Thank you for any help you can provide, Jim. I will follow up with an email listing all of the email addresses of the HOUSE Insurance committee. If you need the Senate committee just let me know. Right now our threat seems to be from the House side. Rose Rose Vaughn Williams Legislative Counsel NC Department of Insurance 919-733-4529" PIANC Board Recommendation May, 2011 PIANC Board of Directors is opposed to the following insurance bills that are now before the NC Legislature. These bills are NC HB834, S477 and S490 to take away rate making powers of the Commissioner of Insurance and the NC Rate Bureau and other authority. Ask yourself, why are these large insurance Companies pushing for passage of these bills, which if passed, the Commissioner of Insurance will have little or no authority or control of insurance Companies. If any agent wants to know what will happen if these bills are passed into Law, just look at California and they are now trying to give the California Commissioner back his powers. It was a disaster when California took away the Commissioners powers of regulation and rate making. The Commissioner is asking each agent to contact their local legislators to vote against these bills. Bulletin 11-B-03 - NC Disaster and Emergency Operations (22.5KB) (Adobe Reader Required) The NC Department of Insurance is pleased to announce a new online newsletter for licensees and companies in North Carolina, Eye on DOI. This publication will be emailed to you quarterly and will focus on issues that impact our licensees and the industry including legislative updates, NCDOI news, regulatory actions taken and more. Check out the most recent issue here: http://www.ncdoi.com/asd/EyeOnDOINewsletter/2010/EyeOnDOI_Newsletter_August2010.pdf If you have questions about the articles, please contact the employee or division listed at the end of each article. For newsletter content suggestions, feel free to email newsletter@ncdoi.gov; however, please note that we may not respond to all email inquiries individually. New DOI law on licensing (Power Point Presentation - Click Here to View (444.6KB) Continuing Education Exemption Eliminated Effective October 1, 2010, the Department adopted the continuing education (CE) exemptions under the Producer Licensing Model Act (PLMA) which allows exemptions from insurance CE only for military and medical reasons. In addition, the Department grandfathered all agents who had qualified and received a CE exemption for age/years in the business /insurance designation (AGE). Click Here to View (325.5KB) (Adobe Reader Required)
Membership Resources \| Education/Events \| Insurance Markets \| Insurance For Agents \| News \| About Us \| Conferences/CE Classes \| YIP Professional Insurance Agents of North Carolina PO Box B, Henderson, NC 27536 877.401.6822 Penny.Rose@piaofnc.com or 877.987.4262 Jim.Kennedy@piaofnc.com