UAIIA Newsletter - November 2009

Below is an electronic copy of our state association newsletter.

For a flyer on the benefits of membership, please click on the following link: www.uaiia.org/benefits.pdf

Thanks to our 2009 Associate Members: Acuity, Advanced Restoration, LLC, Allied Insurance, American Mining Insurance Co., Austin Mutual Insurance Co., Auto-Owners Insurance Co., Bear River Mutual Insurance Co., BELFOR Property Restoration, Burns & Wilcox, LTD, Capital Premium Financing, Inc., Chubb, CNA Insurance, CSE (Civil Service Employees) Insurance Co., Colonial General Insurance Co., Colorado Casualty, Continental Western Group, Cresta Insurance, LLC, Dairyland Auto, EMC Insurance Companies, Encompass/Allstate, Employers, Germantown Mutual Insurance Co., HCC Surety Group, Kemper, Legacy Insurance Services, Inc., Magna Carta Companies, MetLife Auto & Home, Mountain States Insurance Group, MULTICO Rating Systems, Inc., Mutual of Enumclaw, National American Insurance Company, Networked Insurance Agents, Pennsylvania Lumbermens Mutual Insurance Co., Philadelphia Insurance, Premium Financing Specialists, Professional Lines Underwriting Specialists, Inc., Progressive Insurance, Risk Placement Services, Safeco Insurance Co., Sagamore Insurance Company, Santa Fe Auto Insurance Co., Seacoast Brokers, LLC, Servpro of Holladay/Cottonwood, Servpro of Provo, Servpro of St. George, Service Master by Restoration Xperts, State Auto Insurance, Statewide Insurance Corp., Surplus Lines Association of Utah, Swett & Crawford, Total Restoration, Inc., Transwestern General Agency, Travelers, UCA General Insurance, United Automobile Insurance Co., Utah Business Insurance Company, Utah Disaster Kleenup, Victoria Insurance, Western National Insurance Group and Workers Compensation Fund



Utah is a Happy Place

Twittering While Driving

Mexican Insurance Online

Elephant Insurance

Gator Bites Arm off of Golfer

Laptop Protective Services

Mickey Braun to Retire

Flyer with this Newsletter

Top Ten States in Financial Trouble

Utah Official Pleads to Insurance Fraud

Utah Commissioner Warns of Scam



Utah is a Happy Place: Did you know that Utah is the happiest place to live in the country? According to researcher, Jason Rentfrow, of the University of Cambridge in England, Utah came out on top when 350,000 individuals were interviewed as part of the Gallup Organization’s Well-Being Index. The index includes six types of well-being; overall evaluation of their lives, emotional health, physical health, healthy behaviors (such as whether a person smokes or exercises), and job satisfaction.

Following Utah, the next nine states in order are: Hawaii, Wyoming, Colorado, Minnesota, Maryland, Washington, Massachusetts, California and Arizona.



Twittering While Driving At least 22 states that ban texting while driving offer some type of service that allows motorists to get information about traffic tie-ups, road conditions or emergencies via Twitter. The online service might only add to distracted driving, which is what the measures intend to curb. Transportation officials defended their Twitter-enabled program, saying drivers are supposed to check the updates before they drive and not while behind the wheel.



Mexican Insurance Online The most exciting time for Mexico Auto Insurance sales is here. The snowbirds have begun traveling south for the winter and millions of Latin Americans will return to Mexico for the holidays. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to increase your agency revenues over the next few months by going to our website at www.uaiia.org and clicking on the Mexico Insurance link.



Elephant Insurance A new direct auto insurer began business last month. They are a UK based company that has been in business for 17 years with over 2 million policyholders. They have recently opened their U.S. headquarters in Virginia.

Just when we are up to our eyeballs with a Gecko, we get an elephant. They are even using GEICO lines: “We do not use brokers or agents to sell our insurance. When you deal with an insurance agent, you often pay more because the agent is working as a middleman…”

Bob Rusbuldt, IIABA’s President and CEO, thinks the personal lines race will come down to independent agents and direct writers. “The captive agents will eventually be the odd man out. Having a consumer brand, Trusted Choice, is essential to differentiate us and the value we bring to consumers.” To check out the new competition, go to: www.elephant.com.



Gator Bites Arm off of Golfer Officials say an alligator bit off part of a golfer’s arm as he leaned over to pick up his ball at a private South Carolina course. The man, who is in his 70s, was retrieving his ball from a pond when the 10-foot alligator bit him at Ocean Creek Golf Course. The gator pulled the golfer into the pond and ripped off his arm in the struggle. His golf partners were able to free him.

Wildlife workers killed the alligator and retrieved the arm in the hopes it might be reattached. (AP story from the Deseret News)



Laptop Protective Services If you or one of your employees lost a laptop, would you understand your legal exposure? Utah is one of 45 states that have security breach legislation in place. See the law at: http://www.le.utah.gov/UtahCode/getCodeSection?code=13-44-201

To help address this problem, PIA has partnered with MobileSecure to provide insurance agents with a program called Laptop Protective Services. This solution helps agencies take a proactive stand in managing their data security risk by understanding their exposure from lost laptops.

Laptop Protective Services provides a highly secure and easy-to-use fully managed service for agencies to: monitor laptops in your organization; remotely identify files on your laptops to understand your potential data exposure risk; remotely lock down your laptops; and use laptop location history and file audit reports as compliance and audit tools.

The price for our PIA members is $60 per year per laptop and for non-PIA members, $80 per year per laptop. For further information go to: www.pianet.com/LaptopProtectiveServices



Mickey Braun to Retire Mickey Braun has been with the Utah Insurance Department for nearly 23 years, but some of us old timers remember that he was once an independent agent and a member of our association. In fact, he served as a convention chairman for us back in the 80’s.

Mickey will be retiring on December 10th and the department will be having a retirement party for him that day at the State Office Building Auditorium from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. If you would like to wish him well, we are sure he would appreciate it.



Flyer with this Newsletter Watch for the flyer from the Hanover Insurance Group that is included in the paper version of this newsletter.



Top Ten States in Financial Trouble There are several states that are in financial trouble. In fact, there are only two states in the country that are not dealing with budget deficits: Montana and North Dakota. According to the Pew Center on the States, 10 states face severe economic pressures. California, which has been teetering on insolvency for months, is joined by Arizona, Rhode Island, Michigan, Oregon, Nevada, Florida, New Jersey, Illinois and Wisconsin. Pew came up with the list of 10 states by studying six factors: high foreclosure rates, increasing joblessness, loss of state revenue, the relative size of budget gaps, legal obstacles to balanced budgets and poor money management practices. On the heels of the 10 worst states are Colorado, Georgia, Kentucky, New York and Hawaii.

Where does Utah fit in? We are tied for 7th place with Pennsylvania as the best states, but Utah received the best overall money rating (grade A) compared to all the states.

Observation: Isn’t it interesting that 5 of the top 10 happiest places to live (see our Happiest Place to live article in this newsletter) happen to be one of the top 15 states that are in financial trouble. We can’t explain the other 4, but California probably qualifies because of all the medical marijuana dispensaries located within the state.



Utah Official Pleads to Insurance Fraud The former commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety recently entered a conditional guilty plea to two third-degree felony charges of falsely obtaining a prescription and to a misdemeanor count of filing a fraudulent insurance claim.

Scott Duncan resigned from his post in January, citing unspecified health issues. Recently the 57-year-old entered a plea in abeyance, meaning that if he meets certain conditions within 36 months, the charges will be dismissed.

Duncan came to authorities and said he had a drug problem, Assistant Utah Attorney General Shelley Coudreaut told the Deseret News in Salt Lake City. He had apparently gone to multiple doctors in Utah County to get prescriptions for hydrocodone.



Utah Commissioner Warns of Scam Utah officials are warning the public of an international mail fraud scheme involving a bogus letter said to be from Nationwide Insurance. The scam has spread to 10 states, according to the Utah Department of Insurance.

Residents in 10 states have received counterfeit checks bearing the nationwide name. Each check has been issued in the amount of $4,500 and has been accompanied by a letter which informs the recipient that they are the winner of a $150,000 “Consumer Promotion Draw” organized for consumers who shop in major stores in the US, Canada and United Kingdom.

The letter goes on to explain the $4,500 check has been issued to cover the “Non-Resident Government Tax” the consumer will have to pay to a British Tax Officer, according to the department warning.

In order to receive the $150,000 prize, recipients are told they must cash the check and then forward $3,750, by Moneygram International or via a Western Union Money Transfer, to an address located in the United Kingdom. While residents are provided with a 1-866 number to call, they are urged to keep the matter confidential until their claim has been processed.

The individuals generating the correspondence and counterfeit checks have no affiliation with Nationwide Insurance and are fraudulently using the Nationwide name.