Conn. Agents: ?We're Not Like Marsh'
By Matt Brady, Washington Bureau
NU Online News Service, Nov. 11, 10:48 a.m. EDT?An executive with an independent insurance agents group in Connecticut is seeking to distance his organization from large national brokers that have become a target for New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.[@@]
"It is important we speak out…so people understand how we are in a different world than the large brokers," Warren C. Ruppar, executive vice president of the Independent Insurance Agents of Connecticut, said at the group's midyear meeting earlier this week.
Mr. Spitzer has begun an investigation of some of the major insurance brokers' dealings. Mr. Ruppar said that too many people in the government and the general public do not comprehend the difference between such major brokers and their own local independent insurance agents, whom he noted are small-business men and women.
The IIAC is the Connecticut affiliate of the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America.
Mr. Spitzer launched a probe into insurance brokerage compensation practices in April when he subpoenaed the records of Marsh Inc. and several other brokerages.
Last month he created a storm when his office brought criminal charges against several ACE Ltd. and American International Group employees and filed a civil suit against the Marsh McLennan Inc, charging its Marsh Inc. brokerage unit had rigged bids and inflated prices for customers in exchange for payoffs from insurers.
The expanding New York probe in conjunction with the state's insurance department has been followed by inquiries in five other states with subpoenas being issued for the records of many other insurers and brokers in the life and health businesses as well as the property-casualty sector.
A hearing on the issue is scheduled for next Tuesday before a Senate committee, and the NAIC has created a 12-member Executive Task Force to decide how the state regulators will deal with the issue.
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