With a four-year reprieve from hurricanes, the Florida insurance industry enters the 2010 hurricane season with its claims paying mechanisms in a much-improved condition from the past few years.

Decisions such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency's to delay charging market rates for policies sold in certain areas under the deficit-ridden National Flood Insurance Program, could become more common, an insurer group said.

Think of real-time technology processing--the ability to access carrier information through an agency management system immediately--as a recently planted lawn with lots of young grass, but also some patches of brown.