Calif.’s Employers Direct Now Wants Agents

Just a short time after announcing it was leaving the California workers’ compensation insurance market because it was not profitable, direct writing Employers Direct Insurance Co. changed its tune and said it is going to come back, only this time with agents and brokers selling its policies.

Employers Direct said that it is no longer going to sell policies directly in California and would sell through independent agents and brokers from now on.

The Southern-California-based company said that it has given access to its renewal business to GNW-Evergreen Insurance Services, of Encino, Calif. for quotes from other carriers. The insurer said it will use GNW-Evergreen as a producer in Arizona, California, and Nevada.

Employers Direct lost $60 million in 2008 and has said it can’t charge a rate it needs in the current competitive market. Its loss ratio for 2008 was 124 percent. The company has about one percent of the market.

“This is really about our strategy of coming back into the market most effectively,” said Mark Webb, vice president at Employers Direct. “California still remains the most important market for us.”

Earlier this summer Employers Direct cut its workforce by 18 percent. Some of those people now work for GNW-Evergreen.