No fooling - here's a roundup of the industry news you need but may have missed.
April 1, 2021
Since the start of the pandemic, more than half of homeowners made improvements to their property, according to Hippo, which noted 71% said they'd continue making the same amount of home improvements moving forward. Are your policyholders updating their coverges accordingly?
If you serve the transportation industry, you must keep an eye on these programs that could impact your trucking risk management this year.
Insurance Journal is seeking young independent insurance agents – those 40 and under – to share their thoughts on the insurance industry, their job and their future as a young professional in the annual Young Agents Survey.
Commercial lines insurer CNA reported that it has sustained a “sophisticated cybersecurity attack" that caused a network disruption and impacted certain CNA systems, including corporate email.
If CNA in vulnerable, with their vast IT resources, aren't you? Check out our Cyber coverage options.
The 2020 Property/Casualty Market Share report offers cumulative market data reported on insurers' annual financial statements to the NAIC as of March 15, 2021, for business conducted in the U.S. states and territories and Canada. An estimated 98.29% of P&C filings have been received to date.
Be sure you check to see where your carriers stand to protect your agency.
Digital communications are more important than ever, but one particular tool can increase landing page conversion rates by 80%.
If you are not using digital marketing, it's time. Check out the new resources from Trusted Choice.
The most recent tallies of financial results by rating agency analysts reveal that the property/casualty insurance industry weathered the storms of catastrophe losses and COVID, with one segment actually reporting better combined ratios and higher income than in 2019.
The U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 842, the “Protecting the Right to Organize" (PRO) Act. The PRO Act would drastically change the nation's labor laws and includes a provision that could significantly impact your agency. Among other things, the legislation seeks to change the definition of “independent contractor" in a way that could cause significant disruption to you and your customers.
E-commerce giant Amazon.com is getting into the insurance game through a new partnership with digital insurtech company Next Insurance. Through the partnership, Amazon Business Prime members can obtain a small business insurance quote from Next Insurance. Business Prime members can also immediately purchase general liability, professional liability, workers' compensation, commercial auto, as well as tools & equipment insurance from the insurtech.
This is just another reason why you need to develop and implement strong social media strategies for your agency.
Not many speak of this elephant in the insurance room, even though there are thousands of them: condominium policies. So what's the big deal? Renter policy, condo policy, my stuff is covered if I have a claim . . . or so the resident thinks. That half-million dollar view of the Gulf of Mexico is nice as a renter, but when ownership issues come into play, it gets more complicated.
Do your CSRs talk with your insureds about their rental properties to ensure that they are adequately covered?
The New York State Department of Financial Services (DFS) is calling on its regulated insurers to prioritize diversity of leadership and says it will begin collecting and publishing diversity data from insurers this year to promote transparency.
These new actions were spelled out in a circular letter DFS issued today to New York-regulated insurers and come amid a push by the department to promote diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) within the state's insurance industry.
Merchants Insurance Group, a group of property and casualty insurance companies serving policyholders in New England, the Mid-Atlantic, and the Midwest, has announced the appointment of Charles E. Makey III (pictured) as president, effective April 01. Makey currently serves as the company's senior vice president of insurance operations.
The long period of soft market conditions in cyber insurance is coming to an end. Due to the growing frequency and severity of ransomware incidents, which continue to hit record highs, insurers have started to seek more rate and toughen their underwriting guidelines to both control costs and protect their books. However, one expert says that what's happening in the cyber insurance marketplace is less of a hardening and more of a re-evaluation of risk.
So, you met an insurance company recruiter at career fair, or you read some of our articles and decided to apply for an entry level role in the company. You're about to finish your college degree, probably not in RMI, and want to maximize your chances of getting an offer. Read on to find out what to do.
Want to help promote the industry? Send this article to clients that have college age children!
We should prepare for a big agency errors and omissions (E&O) litigation wave to crash their shores in 2021. Agency E&O claims are a lagging indicator, meaning plaintiffs typically only go after us after they exhaust other legal avenues -- most often suing insurers -- and come up short, according to experts at the 2020 virtual Professional Liability Underwriting Society (PLUS) conference.
While E&O claims from the pandemic of 2020 have not happened yet in noticeable numbers, they will, just as they happen following major storms or other disasters, the experts warned.
Be sure you and your staff are ever-mindful of the many strategies on how to avoid losses. Register now for our upcoming E&O Seminar.
Insurance pricing was up across most lines and classes globally in the final quarter of 2020, and that upward pricing trend looks set to continue well into 2021, according to Aon's Q4 2020 Global Market Insights Report.
The COVID-19 pandemic and connected economic downturn has heightened underwriting scrutiny and risk aversion at a time when the market was already being tested by a confluence of macro factors and events, including more frequent natural catastrophes, social inflation, and the sustained low interest rate environment, which is impacting the industry's ability to make strong returns on underwriting and investment income.