AASCIF - First Quarter 2010

The Board of Directors of Louisiana Workers' Compensation Corporation (LWCC) has declared a 2009 dividend of $15 million, to be paid to qualifying policyholders in early 2010 upon authorization by the Louisiana Department of Insurance. Once distributed, this will bring LWCC's cumulative total dividend paid to policyholders over the past seven yeras to $136,796.519.

More than 18,000 policyholders will receive a portion of the dividend. Individual dividend awards are based on a calculation that takes into account policyholders' premium payments and longevity with LWCC over the last five years.

"LWCC is committed to providing policyholder value, and our financial strength and stability have allowed the company to return a dividend for seven consecutive years," said LWCC President and CEO Kristin W. Wall.

"In addition to declaring a divident, LWCC reduced overall rates in 2009 by 12.9%, achieving an overall rate reduction of 53% since the company began operations in 1992," said LWCC Chairman Aubrey T. Temple, Jr.

John W. Hawie has been hired by LWCC as Senior Vice President and Chief Investment Officer. He left a position as Senior Vice President and Chief Investment Officer for Commerce Group in Webster, MA., to take the newly created LWCC post.

Hawie was employed by Commerce Group since February 2003 and was responsible for $2.5 billion in fixed income and equity investments.

Prior to that, he served as Team Leader/Portfolio Manager for General Re-New England Asset Management in Farmington, CT.

Hawie earned his B.A. degree, with concentrations in finance and philosophy, from Emory University in Atlanta. He received his MBA degree, with a concentration in finance, from Vanderbilt Univerisyt in Nashville, then four years later attained his Chartered Financial Analyst degree.

Maryland

Maryland's IWIF Workers' Compensation Insurance welcomes Paul V. Gill, Sr. as the newest member of the IWIF Board of Directors. Board members are appointed by the Governor to serve a five-year term, and are eligible to serve a maximum of two terms.

The Board of Directors recently approved a new class code for information systems development as well as new rates effective January 1, 2010. The new class code is an IWIF-specific class code for use with operations consisting of computer programmers and software development. The approved rates include a decrease for 365 of 588 individual class codes, which is due to a continued decline in claims frequency over the past year. However, the overall change in rates will result in a 2.5% increase. The increase is driven primarily by benefit level changes approved over the past two years.

IWIF recently received the 2009 Interface Partner Award from insurance technology company Applied Systems. The award recognizes IWIF's achievement in agency-carrier communications. Applied Systems acknowledged IWIF's leadership and innovation, citing IWIF's commitment to providing agents with download and real-time rating.

Chief Deputy Executive Director Francine James announced that NYSIF is lowering disability benefits insurance standard premium rates to all new and existing policyholders effective January 1, 2010. The NYSIF disability benefits standard premium for New York State coverage on new or renewing policies is now gender neutral at $0.14 per $100 of payroll for male and female employees.

The new rate represents a 12.5% rate decrease for male employees and a 56% decrease for female employees. The new standard premium will be the lowest NYSIF disability benefits rate in more than 20 years.

Also in 2010, NYSIF is approved to begin offering enriched disability benefits coverage. For the first time, employers who want to offer increased disability benefits to their employees can opt for Enriched NYSIFDB based on the same low rate structure.

Since 1950, employers have take advantage of NYSIF low-cost disability benefits insurance. Disability benefits insurance coverage is mandatory in New York State and provides partial temporary wage replacement for off-the-job injury or illness. Immediate quotes are available at www.nysif.com. NYSIF currently insures 61,000 disability benefits policyholders.

NYSIF Deputy Executive Director Thomas Gleason was honored by the New York Claim Association (NYCA) at their yearend dinner. Chosen unanimously, Mr. Gleason was presented with the NYCA Award of Excellence in recognition of service to the insurance industry.

Like NYSIF, NYCA is celebrating its 95th year of service. NYCA is dedicated to the advancement of education and ethics in New York claims management, with a concentration in workers' compensation and no fault insurance. Members consist of insurance carriers, attorneys, self-insureds, third-party administrators, risk managers and health care providers.

NYCA President Annette Malpica said: "NYCA is pleased to honor Thomas Gleason…His illustrious career in workers' compensation spans over 30 years in both public and private practice.”

The CompSource Legislative Task Force established under House Bill 1963 completed its study on the possible privatization of CompSource. While some Task Force members believe CompSource should remain unchanged, House Bill 1963 did not provide for that option. The final report from the Task Force, which included individual member recommendations, was presented to Governor Brad Henry and the state Legislature on Dec. 1, 2009. The majority of the Task Force members recommended mutualization of CompSource as a tax-exempt entity.

A bill may be introduced in the next legislative session to challenge the ownership of CompSource's assets with the question being, "Do CompSource's assets belong to CompSource's policyholders or do they belong to the state?" Although this issue was previously addressed and settled per a unanimous Supreme Court ruling in Moran vs. Derryberry in 1975, there is continued discussion that it may be challenged.

No doubt, 2008 was a difficult financial year for many Oklahoma businesses. Consequently, CompSource policyholders have been more receptive to programs that may improve the bottom line without increasing expenses. In response, CompSource continues to expand the loss prevention tools it provides to its policyholders by assisting them with safety orientation programs to fit their specific business operations.

SAIF Corporation is using the Flu Fighters, a group of cartoon characters developed in-house, to educate employees on flu prevention in the workplace. The Flu Fighters – Maxine Vaccine, Hans Washer, and Andy Septic – were featured on posters and on SAIF’s intranet. They became so popular that they were made available on SAIF’s website as a public service to all Oregon employers. To view SAIF’s Flu Fighter posters, just go to: www.saif.com/flu.

SAIF’s new video series on office ergonomics gives employers easy access to training and instruction. The videos, called “Office ergonomics: Simple solutions,” teach employers how to conduct ergonomic assessments for their primary equipment (chair, monitor, keyboard, etc.) in their offices at their convenience. The videos also free up SAIF safety representatives so they can provide other priority services to customers and use resources more effectively.

To better communicate SAIF’s story, the "Careers" section of the company’s website has been revised. The old Careers home page showed just the job openings; the new home page reveals what it's like to work at SAIF, using videos of SAIF employees. The layout includes links to three important pages: "Meet our team," "Life at SAIF," and "Current openings.” And an "Upcoming events" area gives readers a quick view of job fairs SAIF will be attending. The biggest change is a new application system, which will be used by both internal and external applicants. See for yourself. Check out the new Career section on saif.com.

Combined Agents of America LLC (CAA) has named Texas Mutual a Top Four Company Partner. The award went to the four carriers CAA placed the most written premiums with in 2009.

Purchasing groups underwritten by Texas Mutual earned a combined total of more than $19 million in dividends in 2009. The dividends were based largely on each group's loss ratio.

The largest dividend ($4.5M) went to the Texas Oil & Gas Association, followed by the Texas Restaurant Association ($2.7M) and CompGroup AGC ($1.4M).

Group dividends were separated from the $75M in individual dividends Texas Mutual paid in 2009.

Texas Mutual has hired Mike Dileo as senior vice president of claims. Dileo comes to Texas Mutual from the Louisiana Workers' Compensation Corporation. He replaces Lisa Corless, who was promoted to chief operating officer last fall.

Texas Mutual employees donated a company-record $148,736 to the United Way, shattering their $135,000 goal. The company has raised $1.3 million for the United Way since 1999.

Texas Mutual has launched a newsletter for healthcare providers who participate in its healthcare network. Comp at Work is a joint effort between the company's claim and corporate communications teams. The 2009 issues are available at www.texasmutual.com/news/cw.shtm.

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