MORE FLORIDA PROPERTY INSURERS SEEK RATE HIKES

Five more Florida property insurers, with a total of nearly 240,000 customers, have filed for double-digit rate increases months after state lawmakers passed reforms that were designed to reduce rates in the wake of the 2004 and 2005 hurricanes. In so-called “true-up” filings, in which carriers were supposed to have requested new rates that reflected savings from cheaper reinsurance, state regulators had expected an overall 15% reduction in homeowners’ rates. Insurance commissioner Kevin McCarty acknowledged last week that statewide rate reductions would not be that deep. The carriers that have asked for the higher premiums include Auto Owners, Cincinnati Insurance Cos, Florida Farm Bureau, Hartford and Metropolitan P&C. Meanwhile, a task force looking into the handling of hurricane claims by Citizens Property Insurance, the state’s property insurer of last resort, said at the weekend that the carrier lacked adequate staff to handle the more than 307,000 claims that it received following the 2004 and 2005 storms. The task force said that Citizens should use spreadsheet analyses to resolve the remaining 3,330 open claims by end-September.