News Briefs

ILLINOIS

Crop Insurance for African Farmers: Opportunity International, a global microfinance network based in Oak Brook, Ill., announced its partnership with the World Bank and its affiliated IFT Commodity Management Group to provide index-based weather insurance to rural farmers in Malawi, Africa. This new policy, test piloted among 892 low-income groundnut farmers in famine-stricken Malawi, extends credit previously inaccessible by mitigating weather risks and isolating farmers and lending institutions from environmental factors.

Opportunity International and the World Bank designed the coverage to pay out if insufficient rainfall for groundnut production occurred in Malawi. Before the new policy, banks were unwilling to lend to farmers primarily because of the risk that farmers would not have the ability to pay back loans if there was a drought. By clarifying environmental affects with the assistance of weather stations and establishing growth periods and expectations, farmers can secure funds needed to purchase a more profitable seed and lenders are confident to issue loans.

The policy also provides area lenders, including the Opportunity International Bank of Malawi, the ability to extend operations due to a new security loan that will be paid in full even in the situation of extreme drought. The index based weather insurance has been well received by farmers and lending institutions in Malawi.

Opportunity International offers small loans, basic business training, health education and insurance and savings services to more than 760,000 poor entrepreneurs in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. For more information about Opportunity International, visit http://www.opportunity.org/.

Adjuster Gets Prison for Fraud: A former Indiana insurance adjuster and his wife were sentenced to prison after admitting to a scheme to bilk The Hartford insurance company out of more than $500,000, according to the Indianapolis Star. U.S. District Judge Larry J. McKinney sentenced Ronald C. Collins Jr., 37, to 33 months in prison. His wife, Melissa Trel Hurley-Collins, 35, received 27 months. Both pleaded guilty to single counts of conspiracy and mail fraud, U.S. Attorney Susan W. Brooks announced. Both also were ordered to pay back $545,128.24, the amount they were accused of stealing.

Authorities said that while employed with The Hartford, Ronald Collins falsified auto accident claims, causing settlement checks for accidents that had occurred to be mailed payable to nonexistent people. His wife opened bank accounts and post office boxes using fictitious names, picking up the checks and cashing them.

Collins had been a supervisory claims adjuster for the national insurance and financial services firm since at least 1998. He had the authority to settle claims of up to $35,000 made against The Hartford’s personal automobile insurance policies “without further approval or review,” authorities said.

Copyright 2005 IndyStar.com. All rights reserved

DOI Copying Charges: The Indiana Department of Insurance adopted its final guidelines for medical records copying charges, increasing those charges over objections voiced last summer by the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies and the Insurance Institute of Indiana, according to the Institute.

The final rule establishes the following charges for copying patient medical records: $1 per page for the first 10 pages; $.50 per page for pages 11-50; $.25 per page for pages 51 and higher. A labor fee, not to exceed $20, may be charged. The actual costs of mailing the medical records may be collected. Also, a charge not to exceed $20 may be charged for certifying a patient’s medical records.

Gov. Mitch Daniels approved the new rule on Sept. 14, 2005. The final rule adoption was announced in the Nov. 1, 2005, issue of the Indiana Register.

IOWA

Tornado Damage Estimate: Insurance adjustors surveying damage from recent tornadoes in central Iowa say the devastation equals that of Hurricane Andrew that hit Florida in 1992, according to The Associated Press.

State Farm Insurance had 30 homes insured in Stratford and Woodward and eight were categorized as severely damaged. One insurance agent says his company had issued 300-thousand dollars in a one-hour span. Illinois-based Allstate had four claims from the storm with damage ranging from a few shingles missing on the roof, to serious structural damage. The unusual November tornado killed a woman and destroyed about 40 homes in Woodward and 30 in Stratford.

OHIO

Workers’ Comp Fund Expenses: After years of high surpluses and generous repayments to employers, Ohio’s state insurance fund for injured workers is trying to better balance income and expenses as it addresses issues raised by an investment scandal. The Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation has set a goal of spending just less than $1 for every $1 it takes in to process claims by injured workers. That would be a marked change from its current practice, whereby it spends $1.31 for every $1 it receives from businesses.

The current income-to-expenses ratio is lower than in past years, when the state sometimes spent more than three times what it took in. In 1998, for example, the bureau spent $3.23 for every dollar it took in from employers. The same year, however, the agency’s investments were so strong that it gave back $3.6 billion to employers.

MINNESOTA:

Court Dismisses Claims in Safelite Suit: A federal court judge dismissed the final three claims yesterday in an Independent Glass Association (IGA)-backed lawsuit against Safelite Group, Inc., parent company of Safelite Solutions LLC and Safelite Fulfillment, Inc. The ruling was made by Judge Ann D. Montgomery of the United States District Court of Minnesota in the case of Independent Glass Association, Inc., et al. v. Safelite Group, Inc., et al. (Case No. 05-238 ADM/AJB).

The lawsuit was filed in February 2005 by the Independent Glass Association, a Minnesota consumer, a Nebraska consumer, and an unidentified Minnesota adjuster. In August, the court dismissed IGA’s claims of unfair competition under the federal Lanham Act, along with its claims of fraud, deceptive trade practices, violation of Minnesota’s Consumer Fraud Act, False Advertising Act and state insurance adjuster licensing laws. Columbus, Ohio-based Safelite Group is the parent company of Safelite Fulfillment, Inc., a provider of auto glass repair and replacement services, Safelite Glass Corp., a fabricator of aftermarket windshields, and Safelite Solutions LLC, an administrator of property and casualty claims.

ATV Safety Standards: ATV manufacturers in the United States, who for decades resisted federal safety regulations on their vehicles, are now embracing them as foreign companies try to crack the U.S. market. Sens. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., and Mark Dayton, D-Minn., recently introduced legislation that would for the first time regulate all ATVs sold in the U.S. It would make mandatory in law safety standards that manufacturers like Minnesota’s Polaris and Arctic Cat Inc. meet voluntarily, but that foreign ATV makers do not. Coleman, chief sponsor of the legislation, said it’s important that Arctic Cat and Polaris are “not tagged with the sins of faulty workmanship and poor standards” of others in the industry. Dayton said the legislation is a “trifecta” of safety, fairness and benefits for Minnesota’s economy. Medina-based Polaris employs 2,200, while 1,500 people work at Thief River Falls-based Arctic Cat.

Critics of the legislation contend it’s an effort to push an emerging import industry that sells less expensive vehicles out of the market, while the manufacturers insist it’s about safety.

As ATV sales have risen in recent years, so have the numbers of injuries and deaths associated with the vehicles.

An average of about 500 people a year died in each of the past five years riding ATVs, more than a quarter age 15 or younger. In Minnesota, 43 ATV deaths were reported between 2002 and 2004, and 178 since 1982. It’s not known how many of those involved imports. Imports come from China, Taiwan, South Korea and Italy. Early last month, the Consumer Product Safety Commission said it would explore voluntary safety standards and possibly make them mandatory. The Coleman-Dayton bill would, in effect, speed up the process.

NORTH DAKOTA

DOI Staffer Aids Katrina Victims: The North Dakota Department of Insurance sent a staff person to assist in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. Kathy Wolf, a property and casualty complaint investigator who has been with the department for 16 years, spent two weeks in Kansas City, Mo. working on a phone bank established at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners headquarters to assist policy holders across the gulf region with their insurance-related questions.

Wolf, who has worked extensively with property and casualty insurance issues, including those related to the Grand Forks flood, said that her experience in Kansas City was gratifying, adding, “Unfortunately, most people don’t think about insurance until something bad happens. Knowing that I was helping people put their lives back together gave me a sense of deep satisfaction.”