Lott Says Insurers May Be Saddling U.S. With Hurricane Claims
June 27, 2006 (Bloomberg)
U.S. legislators including Senator Trent Lott say home insurers may be saddling the National Flood Insurance Program with wind-related hurricane claims, driving up taxpayers' costs from last year's record storm damage.
Lott, a Mississippi Republican, and Representative Gene Taylor, a Mississippi Democrat, are calling for a probe of insurers such as State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. and Allstate Corp., which act as the claims adjusters for the federal flood program. The House votes today on whether to raise the program's borrowing authority by $4.2 billion to $25 billion. It would be the fourth increase since Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma devastated the Gulf Coast.
"Many have been highly irresponsible, basically hiding behind the federal flood insurance program to get out of paying for wind damage," said Lott, who sued State Farm in December over Katrina's damage to his waterfront home. "We ought to investigate that.''
Taylor, who also sued State Farm, has proposed an amendment to the House bill that would direct the Department of Homeland Security to review whether insurers are misclassifying the cause of damage from Katrina because their policies exclude flood- related claims. Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood said he's investigating whether insurers asked engineering firms to doctor damage reports, and Taylor said he and his constituents have witnessed an abuse of power firsthand.
"They had made up their mind before they ever saw the situation that they were going to blame everything on the water and say nothing occurred with the wind" Taylor said of his own adjuster, sent by State Farm.
Spokesmen for State Farm and Allstate, among the biggest home insurers in Mississippi and Louisiana, said their companies assess flood claims following guidelines the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
FEMA Guidelines
"Even before Katrina, FEMA and the National Flood Insurance Program have had an ongoing review and claim re-inspection program to ensure appropriate NFIP guidelines are being followed," said Phil Supple of Bloomington, Illinois-based State Farm.
The federal flood program, which collects premiums from policyholders, was created in 1968 so the government wouldn't have to subsidize flood victims in the absence of private insurance. Congress let insurers sell policies and adjust claims on behalf of the government because they already had a network of agents that would have been hard to duplicate, said Butch Kinerney, a spokesman for FEMA.
"This points out the danger of having a government flood insurance program outside of the private insurance industry," said Donald Thorpe, an insurance analyst at Fitch Ratings in Chicago. "You have a major event like this, and there is a lot of arguing about who should pay for it."
No "Widespread" Issues
The federal flood program paid out $15 billion in claims in the 36 years prior to last year, and estimates the three major 2005 storms will require as much as $23 billion in payouts, Kinerney said.
Katrina, which put most of New Orleans under water, cost private insurers an estimated $40.6 billion, contributing to a record $61.2 billion in 2005 catastrophe losses, said Property Claim Services, a Jersey City, New Jersey-based firm that surveys insurers about claims.
"So far we haven't had any widespread issues with the way the adjusters are doing their work," Kinerney said. "If somebody had a notion that all the insurance claims in a town were looking strange, we would certainly go back and look. We are not going to try unless directed. It would be cost-prohibitive and take years to do."
The legislators' suits against State Farm say the company, the largest home insurer in the country, wrongfully characterized damage to their homes in order to avoid paying claims. Both are among Mississippi residents suing through Richard Scruggs, an Oxford, Mississippi-based attorney who successfully wrested a $206 billion settlement from the tobacco industry in 1998.
Senate Bill
The House bill, sponsored by Representative Richard Baker, a Louisiana Republican, was approved by the Financial Services Committee, run by Ohio Republican Michael Oxley.
A competing Senate bill, approved by the Banking Committee, would allot the flood program as much money as needed for claims and would exempt it from repaying debt, said Andrew Gray, a spokesman for the panel.
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To contact the reporters on this story:
Jesse Westbrook in Washington at jwestbrook1@bloomberg.net .
Last Updated: June 27, 2006 12:02 EDT
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