Risk & Insurance articles from November 2004

Risk & Insurance archives from November 2004

The repercussions of Eliot Spitzer's October indictment of Marsh, the world's largest insurance broker.
November 1, 2004... The repercussions of Eliot Spitzer's October indictment of Marsh, the world's largest insurance broker, may hit at the heart of the insurance business if it's found to go well beyond Marsh. Marsh was supposed to be the gold-plated standard...

Hung up on titles?(Letters To The Editor)(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2004... Dear Editor: Regarding the story "The CRO: A Species at Risk," (Risk & Insurance, Sept. 1, 2004, page 20), I think the article misses a key point. The issue is not one of whether middle management or others are getting a particular title,...

Respondents favor guaranteed coverage.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... Two out of three American adults (67 percent) think health care coverage should be a guarantee, a new survey conducted by Opinion Research Corp. shows. In addition, three out of four American adults (78 percent) agree that health care is a...

Ceded premiums rise 16 percent.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... In 2003 total U.S. premium ceded to alien reinsurers was $53.5 billion and ceded recoverables totaled $102.4 billion, a 15.9 percent growth in premiums and a 9.0 percent growth in recoverables since 2002. Meanwhile, alien companies' share of...

Vermont registers 700th captive.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... Helmerick & Payne Corp. an energy-oriented company engaged in contract drilling in the U.S. and South America, has established Vermont's 700th captive insurance company, according to the Vermont Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and...

Stand-alone A-Side D&O purchasing rises.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... A survey of D&O insurance buying trends found that the total average amount of stand alone A Side coverage purchased was $57 million, with the median at $52 million, indicating an increased emphasis on liability insurance designed specifically...

LOMA honors industry leader.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... King Mawhinney, a former vice president of USAA Life, was awarded the 2004 LOMA Education Award, LOMA has announced, Mawhinney worked with LOMA for 20 years to create globally recognized education programs and implement cutting edge online...

Regulators urge AIG probe.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... SEC regulators have launched an investigation into an AIG division in connection with alleged violations of federal securities laws, AIG has announced. The allegations involve transactions marketed by AIGFP before 2003, including three...

Zurich dispatches claims experts.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... Zurich North America has dispatched a team of insurance experts to the Gulf Coast to help customers in reporting losses suffered in Hurricane Ivan, the company said. They were sent to Alabama, Mississippi and Florida in the wake of Hurricane...

ACORD receives award.(News & Notes)
November 1, 2004... ACORD was presented with The Review Worldwide Reinsurance Industry Initiative of the Year Award for 2004 at a September ceremony in London. Among the reasons cited in the awards program for this honor was the rapidly increasing implementation...

Quote of the month.(Upfront: news, updates and other emerging strategies from around the world)
November 1, 2004... "The way to wealth is not to rip off somebody for a year but to treat them fairly for ten."

AIRMIC examines outsourcing risk vs. reward: sometimes farming out tasks has unintended consequences, such as the U.K. national rail system that privatized the railroads and saw the number of accidents rise.(Upfront: news, updates and other emerging strategies from around the world)
November 1, 2004... Outsourcing has been a major transformer of Europe's business landscape in recent years. Originally embraced by companies as a means to cut costs, the emphasis has shifted to focusing on core competencies and delivering better service by...

Niosh study sheds light on bullying and workplace stress: nearly 25 percent of companies who responded in a recent survey said that some degree of bullying had occurred in the previous 12 months.(Upfront: news, updates and other emerging strategies from around the world)
November 1, 2004... Employers' efforts to improve relationships among co-workers could reduce their workers' compensation costs, a new study suggests. Preliminary results indicate bullying between workers is more prevalent than intimidation by supervisors or...

Gearing up for the new calculus: as the European Union prepares for a risk-based approach to capital allocation, discussions turn to a single set of regulations.(Upfront: news, updates and other emerging strategies from around the world)
November 1, 2004... Europe's insurers and reinsurers remain sanguine in the face of the European Commission's new blueprint for tightening capital requirements next year as the prelude to introducing a new regime in 2007. The proposals are an "attempt to...

Correction.(Upfront: news, updates and other emerging strategies from around the world)(Correction Notice)
November 1, 2004... Paul Riley, not Craig Bartol, is chief risk executive for AT&T Corp. Bartol is the risk executive for AT&T Wireless. Risk & Insurance regrets the error.

Fighting fat critical to disability.(Workers' Comp)
November 1, 2004... Does body weight influence prospects of employment, injury, and injury recovery? It seems that obesity can be dangerous, from getting a job to getting back to it after injury. Is our industry up to addressing this challenge? Some say a fat...

Brutal season churns to a close.(Alternative Risk)
November 1, 2004... Everyone knows that a string of hurricanes hit Florida this fall, causing $20 billion-plus in damages, much of it insured. The property-catastrophe reinsurance industry, having enjoyed three relatively good years in terms of claims, is expected...

Speaking of national security.(Benefits)
November 1, 2004... The recent presidential campaigns focused greatly on national security issues and both candidates promised Americans that they would be kept safe, healthy and secure. Now as the newly-elected president prepares for inauguration, he may learn...

Modern masters of fine art risk.(Cover Story)
November 1, 2004... As margins shrink and the rivalry to write fine arts policies intensifies, specialty firms compete against industry insurance and brokerage giants. The prize: to handle collections belonging to museums, cultural institutions, nonprofit...

Trustees ponder the question of trust.
November 1, 2004... Robert L. Dilenschneider, founder and chairman of New York-based The Dilenschneider Group Inc. counsels high-ranking executives at companies around the world. He is hearing a growing concern among trustees of nonprofit groups about how well- or...

Still no closure on disclosure: ambiguity ensures that the debate about what constitutes proper environmental disclosure goes on and on. Companies can protect themselves from uncertainty with sound environmental insurance policies, a writer argues.(Environmental Insurance)
November 1, 2004... Although environmental disclosure is not yet making headlines in the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal, the debate about what constitutes "adequate disclosure" of environmental liabilities is an important corporate governance issue that...

Nursed back to health.(Special report: worker's compensation)
November 1, 2004... With persistence, discipline and the use of statistics, Florida State Hospital has slashed its monthly workers' comp claims to 20 down from the 70 claims each month. The dramatic improvements in worker safety and other areas has helped the...

Leaves of green.(Workers' Comp Report)
November 1, 2004... When the risk management team at retailer Dollar Tree Stores launched its cost-cutting workers' comp program, it had been seeing claims increasing at a double-digit rate. How to curtail those growing claims? Dollar Tree's innovative program was...

Who will manage employee health?(Workers' Comp Report)
November 1, 2004... An annual survey suggests employers are ambivalent about consumer-directed health plans (CDHPs). Short-term, CDHPs appeal to employers who need to shift the crippling burden of health costs onto employees. Longer-term, many employers want to...

Red storm rising.(Workers' Comp Report)
November 1, 2004... Workers' compensation costs continue to present a challenge for today's employers. Medical inflation and claims severity are on the rise. The economic outlook is uncertain and the insurance industry has been plagued by numerous judicial...

The low-down on back pain: low back pain has become an epidemic in industrialized companies. The annual cost of treatment and workers' lost productivity are in the billions of dollars. People suffering from low back pain usually end up in surgery or on restricted activity. Is there a better answer?(Workers' Comp Report)
November 1, 2004... Although it is never fatal, low back pain is the number one cause of disability in people under the age of 45. The epidemic of low back pain disability in industrialized countries requires physicians to reexamine the usual methods of evaluation...

Beefing up.(Agent/Broker)
November 1, 2004... This isn't your father's brokerage business. The days when a desk, a phone and the right contacts were enough to make it as a reinsurance broker are gone. These days it takes lots of computing power, a host of actuaries and sophisticated...

Fighting a war of independence: small brokers, who operate in partnership with independent brokers of similar size to compete for large and midsize commercial accounts, lay claim to significant advances in recent years. The big brokers, however, reassert their advantage of size and scale. This match looks as if it's headed far beyond the 12th round.
November 1, 2004... The skirmish between owned and independent insurance broker networks shows no sign of dying down. Smaller brokers, who don't own their networks, but who operate in partnership with independent brokers of similar size to compete for large and...

Brokers without borders: Assurex Global, a network of commercial insurance brokers, celebrates its Jubilee by insisting on an international perspective and a holistic view of the marketplace.(Agent/Broker)
November 1, 2004... Assurex Global, in its 50th year, is the world's largest privately held risk management and commercial insurance broker network. Gregory S. Belton, president of Hunter Keilty Muntz & Beatty, of Toronto, is AG's current (and first international)...

Securing remote access: with the transition to dial-up access to the Web, IPSec VPN technology arrived on the scene as a way for agents, or field-based employees, to access the company network and data. Now, SSL VPN is emerging as a strong challenger to traditional IPSec VPN.(Technology)
November 1, 2004... As vice president of information technology at MCM Corp., Paul Webb naturally worries about security. MCM, a Raleigh, N.C.-based insurance holding company that owns Occidental Fire & Casualty Co. of North Carolina and Wilshire Insurance Co.,...

Riding the road to recovery: with more people than ever surviving cancer and heart disease, there is a need to help patients recover from those illnesses, regain strength and return to productivity. Rehabilitation therapists--primarily physical and occupational therapists--can expedite the process.(Disability)
November 1, 2004... When Joe suffered a stroke at age 56, the good news was that it was a mild "cerebral vascular accident," and he would likely return to his job within six months. But the bad news for Joe's employer was that not only would she have to find a...

Wise to the ways of the east: a risk manager's inability to recognize the subtleties of manner and words in Asian cultures can torpedo the best business relationship and cost his or her company plenty of money.(Profile)
November 1, 2004... From his post as the top risk manager of a sprawling Singapore holding company that includes familiar names like Singapore Airlines and Neptune Orient Lines, David R Belmont faces many of the same trials and tribulations as his fellow risk...

Relegating letters of credit to the dustbin: credit insurance and advanced financing are gaining wider favor in global trade, and sound risk management practices are finding favor with U.S. exporters. Banks and underwriters are cheering because the trend increases lending capacity and enhances an underused asset class.(Industry risk report: commercial banks)
November 1, 2004... Overt lack of trust is no way to start any relationship, but that is exactly how international markets are coming to view traditional letters of credit (LC). Once the sine que non of international trade, the LC has largely been supplemented and...

Crossing borders with trade credit insurance.(Industry Risk Report)
November 1, 2004... Until recently, exporters to emerging markets had only stopgap measures on which they could rely, They could buy traditional credit insurance, which is used by exporters to developed markets to protect themselves against commercial risks....

Property/casualty.(Insurance)
November 1, 2004... St. Paul Travelers has introduced the company's new logo (below). In developing the logo, the company looked back at the history of each organization. The new logo features an icon that blends an element from each company's history,...

Benefits.(Insurance)
November 1, 2004... First Data Corp., has introduced a multipurpose card to offer consumers more options in paying for health care. One of these options is a line of credit on their health care card. Employers, administrators, payers and employees all benefit...

General liability.(Insurance)
November 1, 2004... The St. Paul Cos. has introduced a new version of Global Companion, an international commercial property and general liability product. The changes will further protect U.S.-based companies from the risks associated with conducting business...

RMIS.(Technology)
November 1, 2004... Xtria LLC, a provider of risk management information systems, has expanded its RMIS portfolio through a strategic marketing and distribution agreement with SAFE Risk Management Systems, a provider of integrated enterprise risk management and...

Compliance.(Technology)
November 1, 2004... AXS-One has released a new version of its compliance software, the company said. The new product is designed to help companies manage their electronic records, including e-mail, instant messaging, documents, faxes and voice mails in order to...

Claims.(Technology)
November 1, 2004... VestaCare Inc. and Eldorado Computing Inc., have announced a partnership to offer claims auto-adjudication solutions to health care payers. The system combines VestaCare's automated preprocessing capabilities with ECI's HEALTHpac...

New California WC law: reforms could improve broken system: California is already seeing benefits from the workers' compensation reforms, but it will take proper administration to realize full potential. All eyes will be on Ms. Hoch.(Point)
November 1, 2004... Former University of Texas football coach Darrell Royal observed, "Potential just means you ain't done it yet." Such is the case with the agreement to reform California's workers' compensation system, embodied in SB 899. It holds great promise...

New California WC law: more pain atop an already massive headache: a reform bill, nicknamed 'House of Horrors'" leaves many an expert scratching their heads on questions of implementation.(Counterpoint)
November 1, 2004... "New solutions breed new problems." This adage is never so tree as in the recently enacted California workers' compensation reform bill, SB 899, and its predecessor SB 228 enacted last fall. Many of the provisions, simple on their face, have...