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October 2008 - Fourth Quarter
Edition
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From
Our President, Michael Hale
In the small town where
I grew up there were two banks, two lawyers and two doctors and a
whole bunch of churches. Most if not all of us trusted all of them
with our money, our health, our rights and our souls. The only
advertising from the group would be posters about an upcoming
revival. As far as I can remember everyone was treated fairly
and we had little or no need for the
government.
Well, I’m grown now and
some might say over grown. And with all of the changes that
have occurred for the good, many are offset by the excesses
that stem from greed. It was a good idea to help struggling
people buy their own home but not a good idea for many layers of
commissions to be developed in the process. Far more money
went to the layers than should have been necessary and people were
over rewarded for simply delivering the
benefit.
All of us in this group
are small business owners and by the nature of our business deal
with the influences of greed on a daily basis and sort through it to
see the correct benefit is delivered to the consumer. We do
not provide this service for a fat reward or a commission but simply
for a fair price for our time. Our reward comes primarily from
the satisfaction of doing an honorable job and supporting our
families.
Next month you will have
the right to vote for the next President of the United States
. Please be sure you find the time in
your schedule to exercise that right and your employees as well and
select the person that you believe will be the best for our
country. The small town support once enjoyed by many of us is
slipping away and we need to make our best evaluation for our
future.
Here at CPLIC RRG
we still have values that set us apart from the crowd. Be
proud of it.
On the Sales
Side...
The move by the Board of
Directors in the first quarter to stop requiring total stock
purchase up front has helped our sales during the year. Our
own Lee Helms brought this proposal to the table for approval.
The way it works is that we quote one price to a new member that has
met underwriting criteria. If accepted we then redirected 10%
of the price to the stock account and it occurs every year until the
requirement is met. We now only require one check to start
along with signed agreements.
How does this affect our
original stockholders? It enhances the position they
hold. It just puts some of our capital to work for us
now. We can currently support a 300% increase in premiums
written and still pass the written to surplus ratio. So with
that in mind please spread the word for us. Those who did not
come in originally because of the stock purchase are welcome to re
apply now.
As always I appreciate your
leads and hearing from you.
Dale Moore,
Director of Client
services
Welcome to our new Members
July 1 - September
31
| Alternative Adjusters,
Ltd. |
| American
Property Damage Appraisers, Inc. |
| Aplin
Peer & Associates, Inc. |
| ClaimPro
Associates, LLC |
| Concordia
Consultancy (Americas), Inc. |
| David
Charles |
| Howard
Wilson Claims Service |
| Insurance
Claims Adjusters, Inc. |
| Jack
Grochala |
| Kenneth
R. Haraughty |
| Louis E.
Smith & Associates, Inc. |
| Nathan
Payne Adjusting |
| Peak
Claims, Inc. |
| Professional Adjusting Services,
Inc |
| RFH
Appraisal Service |
| Spencer
Insurance Services,
Inc. |
From the
Underwriting Side...
In case you
haven’t noticed the underwriting process for new and renewal
business now takes place in our CA office. We started in March
with the new business and July with the renewals and now all is in
Tustin .
We spent the first four
years learning as much as possible about our members and their risk
characteristics and believe we have the modeling and the rates where
we want them. Our loss ratios are supporting that
notion.
Your Underwriting
committee is headed by Frank Marx. They are on top of
developments on a state specific basis and bring changes to the
Board as necessary. These have been few however which speaks
well of the guidelines for acceptability put in place before we even
had a company.
In Tustin , Dale Moore is the
Director of Client Services and is the go to person if you encounter
a problem or have a question. In many cases your actual
response will come from Crystal Cunningham who has been with us
through the development and growth of the program and wears many
hats. Lee Helms who put the model and pricing together still
handles the accounting and provides consulting services in a variety
of areas.
Our intent was for this
transition to be seamless for you but if you do encounter a snag be
sure to let us know.
Photo of the
Quarter
Mr.
Dan Miller, Vice President of Swiss Re, is shown on the left
conducting his annual claim file audit at our CPLIC, RRG Home
Office.
President Michael Hale ignores the camera in
order to continue pointing out only the best on our
behalf. We passed with flying colors
and showed that
once again all can "Depend on the Blue!"
From
the Claims Corner...
For the most part
it is a pleasure to handle the claims presented against our
group. Even in cases where you have never had a claim made
against you before, at least you have a basic understanding of the
system, which makes our job much easier.
Here are a few
common sense tips that will pay dividends for all:
1)
Know your policy reporting requirements. It is on our
web site at www.cplic.net. We do not get any
satisfaction from denying coverage.
2)
Report as early as possible. If suit has been filed,
removal options may be forfeited by delayed notice.
3)
Send as much information as possible in an electronic format
including the underlying claim file (except worker’s
compensation). We currently have a 5 meg limit but you can
break it into parts if necessary.
4)
Be sure to give us all contact information for you and the
handling adjuster including cell numbers.
5)
We will keep you advised as the claim against you
progresses. But if you would like a status at reasonable
intervals, please request if from us and not the defense
attorney. It costs less and will be in layman’s terms.
6)
If defense is being provided by another party, your
principal perhaps, you should still receive and forward to us
pleadings and status reports from defense counsel as the case
progresses. At the conclusion we will need a copy of the
release, dismissal or satisfaction of judgment to close your
file. You also need these documents for your business
records.
Please remember
that we are all in this together. We encourage you to contact
us anytime with any question whether a claim is pending against you
or not.
Special Notice
about how to handle our
Employment Practices Liabilities.
We are all at
risk.
Contact Dale
Moore,
our Director of Client Services, if you are interested in
an EPLI quote for your company.
714-731-7860
RISK
MANAGEMENT CORNER...
Things to Come
by K.M. Johns, III, CPCU, AIM,
ARM
Chairman – Johns Eastern Company,
Inc.
Lakewood Ranch, FL
Some exciting new things will be available to you
shortly on the risk management section of the Claim Professionals
Liability Insurance Company (CPLIC).
To refresh your memory, there are five sections in
our risk management section. These sections are:
-
Things Good Adjusters Do
-
Suggested Forms, Letters & Wordings
-
Commentary on Claims Handling
-
Dealing with Experts
-
What CPLIC’s Claim Department Sees
You will find information in the first three of
those areas.
Soon, we will have increased the number of forms,
letters and wordings available to you. We are attempting to do
this through Word documents, which will allow you to download a form
or letter and then make whatever changes you need on your own to use
it. This is presently being reviewed by our web master to
determine if this is possible. If not, the documents will be
available to you in some other form, which will allow you to
download them, and then either re-type them, or reprocess them, for
your own use.
There will also be a very nice discussion regarding
how to handle and deal with experts.
For those of you who have not recently
visited the web site, or gone into the risk management section, the
user name is: cplicmem07 and the password is:
2004cplic.
The forms and letters to be added are basically on
the property and casualty side. We are presently working on
some forms and letters that will be applicable to workers’
compensation.
Please direct any comments on the risk management
section on the web site to Kjohns@johnseastern.com.
I would appreciate any thoughts that you have.
My thanks to Mike Marsh, Johnny Michalek and Chris
Eirich for their help here.
CPLIC.NET The
source of valuable information about your
RRG | |
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