NCCI President Resigns After Flag Flap
The board of NCCI Holdings has accepted the resignation of Bill Schrempf as president, chief executive officer and board member of the workers' compensation services company, effective immediately, following a controversy over the display of American flags by employees at NCCI's offices.
The announcement comes just weeks after Mr. Schrempf and the Boca Raton, Fla.-based National Council on Compensation Insurance became the targets of criticism after news of a Sept. 14 memo Mr. Schrempf had issued, prohibiting displays of flags in employee cubicles, was reported in a local newspaper.
Mr. Schrempf apologized three days later, announcing a reversal of the policy he said had been in place to protect employees from divisive political discussion. (See NU, Sept. 24, page 50.)
The policy reversal and NCCIs distribution of 850 red, white and blue ribbons to employees did not quiet critics, including Georgia Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine, who vowed to decertify the NCCI as a rating bureau or take away its job of making assignments for the Georgia assigned risk pool.
In a phone interview following NCCIs announcement of Mr. Schrempfs resignation, Commissioner Oxendine said, "I still think its appropriate to continue to make an assessment of the situation" that led to his initial remarks.
While noting that accepting Mr. Schrempfs resignation was "a point in their favor," the commissioner said that the department would still be investigating and reevaluating its relationship with NCCI.
In Fridays announcement, NCCI said that its board will immediately launch a search for a new CEO.
"We will look for a seasoned executive with strong working knowledge of the workers' compensation insurance industry," said Judith A. Blades, who chairs the NCCI board. "The board will move expeditiously but we will take the time needed to find the right person."
NCCI, a shared-services organization serving the workers comp industry, offers a comprehensive array of products and services that enable insurers and other stakeholders to access and use workers' comp data to set loss costs, calculate experience rating modifications, and manage residual market mechanisms.
Reproduced from National Underwriter Property & Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, October 15, 2001. Copyright 2001 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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