Bakke Urges Patience On Auto Reform Atlantic City, N.J.

New Jersey Insurance Commissioner Holly C. Bakke said automobile insurance reform signed into law last week will not change the states insurance climate overnight, but that independent agents will be instrumental in the process of improvement.

Ms. Bakke addressed a group representing the New Jersey Young Insurance Professionals, part of the annual joint Professional Insurance Agents of New Jersey and New York conference held here. She presented her remarks just hours before Gov. James McGreevey signed the Automobile Insurance Competition and Choice Act into law.

Among the features of the bill are provisions to phase out the States “take-all-comers” requirement for insurers and provisions to help fight fraud.

Also included are amendments to the current rules for approving rate increases to ensure that they are acted on promptly. The bill also revises the excess profits law to extend the look-back period for calculating profits to account for short-term market fluctuations.

In addition, high risk drivers, those with 7 or more points on their records, will be moved into a high risk pool and out of the general insurance market. Agents will also get some of their expenditures back, including fees for motor vehicle reports.

“We have to keep in mind that this reform package is not just about companies or agents or regulators. First and foremost, it is about consumers,” Ms. Bakke told the group of agents.

“If consumers dont experience different priced markets and a different shopping experience, we wont be able to fulfill our goals,” she said.

Under the reform legislation, consumers are to receive three pricing and coverage scenarios to compare options. Ms. Bakke emphasized to the agents that this means only three quoting scenarios, not multiple quotes under each scenario.

She asked agents to become partners with the state in implementing the reforms, as they had been when the legislation was being drafted.

Agents, she said, need to spend a little time with customers seeking coverage that the agent cant yet deliver. She asked agents to explain why they are unable to provide the policy the customer is looking for and talk about the reforms that are taking place.

Ms. Bakke noted that the availability of insurers “in this dysfunctional marketplace” is a major issue for agents. New Jersey, which has had problems attracting new insurers and keeping some, will not see new companies running back to the state soon. But the reforms are the foundation for change that will eventually attract them, she said.

“Companies have asked us for certainty all along in this process and I know you [agents] need a degree of certainty too,” Ms. Bakke said. “But I dont know if I, or any governor, or any other commissioner can give complete certainty.”

“What I do know is that this [legislation] gives us the tools to change the market,” she continued.

Mary K. Caffrey, assistant commissioner, told National Underwriter that the department has been getting a number of inquiries from companies expressing an interest in what is happening in the state. She declined to identify the insurers, but said that the department is encouraged that this could be the beginning of improvements.

Ms. Bakke said the department is supporting New Jersey agents efforts seeking protections of their books when companies leave the state.

In the coming months, she said she will be an ambassador to the states auto insurance market and talk to companies and rating agencies about how the reforms will be improving the environment. However, she added that agents must also be ambassadors, explaining to customers the changes, what they can do now, and what they will be able to do later when the full plan takes affect in Jan. 1, 2004.

“Were not going to have GEICO tomorrow. Were not going to have Progressive tomorrow. But they are coming. The time will come.”

(Additional reporting by Daniel Hays.)

Reproduced from National Underwriter Edition, June 16, 2003. Copyright 2003 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved. Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.

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Bakke Urges Patience On Auto Reform

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