Save on Car Insurance

Paying too much for car insurance? Get a girlfriend. However if you are married you might want to reconsider this advice. Wives are usually not open to those kind of arrangements. Jesse Levey recently saved $200 a year on car insurance by having a girlfriend. The 31-year-old Californian, who works in marketing, recently got the pleasant surprise when he added his girlfriend to his auto insurance policy....

Disability Month ahead...

May is National Disability Insurance Awareness Month. In anticipation of this annual event, we bring you startling and compelling evidence that this is must-have covera...

Cavalcade of Risk #130: Call for submissions and CavRisk News

David Williams hosts next week's edition. Entries are due by Monday (the 2nd).NB: We're trying out a new submission tool:The BC WorkAroundOnce there, you'll be asked to provide:■ Your post's url and title■ Your blog's url and name■ Your name and email■ A (brief) summary of the post ("Remarks")At the bottom of the form, you'll see a drop-down menu; simply select "Cavalcade of Risk" then press "Submit"...

About those "sick notes"

During the unruly protests that took place in Wisconsin in February, several health care "professionals" handed out "medical excuse notes" to participants. While any rational lay person would immediately recognize this as a major ethical breach, it's taken this long for said "professionals'" employer to weigh in:"UW Health doctors who wrote sick notes for protesters at the Capitol in February face...

From the Mailbag: Thursday Linkfest

Three (apparently) unrelated but interesting items from our email: ■ Regular readers know that we're big fans of transparency in both the delivery and financing of health care. To that end, we're pleased to pass along the news of a new online database called Fair Health Consumer. Eric Hendrickson tells us that the site's purpose is to "provid[e] consumers with information they need to navigate the...

Is there an app for this? (Stupid Government Trick)

Recently, "smart" phones have been in the news for surreptitiously tracing users' whereabouts. That might actually be a good problem to have, though, if you're the beneficiary of a life insurance policy:"State regulators in California and Florida say they will be looking to see how well life insurers are doing at determining when the life insurance policy insureds have died."There are, in fact, several...

Worksite Woes

Many years ago, working class folks bought life insurance from companies specializing in "industrial" policies. No, this didn't mean that plans were forged from raw steel; rather, these policies had relatively modest death benefits, usually meant to cover final expenses. Rather than check-o-matic, premiums were collected (often weekly) by "the insurance man" working his debit (route).Those days are...

Dumbing down the biz...

Way back in the day (when I first started in this industry), there was a particularly pernicious group of agents we called "termites:" their sole mission in life, as directed by the home office of now defunct A L Williams, was to dupe unwitting victims into cashing out perfectly good permanent life insurance policies in favor of a long-discredited concept known as "BTID" (buy term and invest the difference)....

Quick: Duck!

After erstwhile Aflac spoke(something) Gilbert Gottfired was cut loose due to his remarkable insensitivity (much less business acumen), the call went out for a set of replacement vocal chords.After auditioning well over 12,000 would-be duckmeisters, the worksite insurance behemoth has given the nod to a Minnesota radio sales manager and father of three, 36 year old Daniel McKeague:"McKeague recorded...

Dear Agent

To: (local agent) Subject: anthem sucks..HSA 841******9 Hey (local agent)!I sent Anthem the form to change my insurance agent to you and they never took action.They are now jacking up my insurance rate,again...from $412.(HSA plan) to $509. I cannot stand this company.Is there another company out there for me?I will be 64 in November. I do have existing hashimotos (hypothyroid) disease and skin cancer...

Say, is that a policy in your pouch?

While we've blogged on the general topic of pet insurance before, this item really jumped out:"An anonymous donor has purchased a $50,000 insurance policy to help an Oklahoma woman keep her pet kangaroo as a therapy pet. "It's not really "pet insurance" per se: rather, it's a liability policy required by a yet-to-be-enacted local ordinance pertaining to the keeping of "exotic pets." It's similar...

Rebirth

Easter for Christians is a time of rebirth. For others it is just another day.The commercialization of Easter is akin to Christmas. Perhaps it is me, but it seems Christian holidays are becoming secular events while holidays (or holy days) in other religions are not.Easter is historically a pagan event. Eggs, lilies, bunnies and chicks associated with Easter have their roots in pagan celebrations...

Stupid Carrier Tricks #1648

Apparently, some carriers still don't quite get that our clients do not belong to them, and that we don't much like "poachers."The rocket surgeons who run United Healthcare seem to think that agents are simply a "necessary (for now) evil" that can be ridden roughshod over:[Click to embiggen]The letter, from Operations CEO Dirk...

Industry News: Life and Health edition

■ First up, some (good?) news from the Medical Information Bureau (MIB):"U.S. life insurers researched more requests for individual coverage in March than they did in March 2010, and activity for older applicants continued to be strong."That's interesting on several levels. First, it suggests that more folks are buying life insurance (although at least some of these are likely replacements for older...

The MVNHS© Bites (Back)

Offered without (additional) comme...

Baby Joseph Update

Last time we checked in with Baby Joseph was a month ago, at which time he had been evacuated from Canada to St Louis. His prognosis hadn't really changed, but his level of care was much improved.Now we learn that "(f)ifteen-month-old Joseph Maraachli, known to the world as “Baby Joseph,” was transported from ... St. Louis, where he received a tracheotomy last month ... He arrived in Windsor, Ontario,...

HuffPo Whiffs It

Wendy Potter rants on HuffPo about how the Paul Ryan plan to overhaul Medicare and save the federal government from financial suicide is actually a windfall to insurance companies.Just shows his ignorance about the real world.Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, wants to dismantle the Medicare program and replace it with a system of vouchers. Starting in 2022, the government would give the...

&*$# Health News Links

An inexpensive diabetes medication may hold a key to curing breast cancer:"Scientists have developed a new test that identifies patients who could benefit from the cheap treatment. They found that the people whose cancer cells “fed” off high-energy compounds were more likely to see their tumours spread or to die ... If cancer cells are consuming high-energy food, this makes a tumour more aggressive...

Cavalcade of Risk #129 now online

Bob at Christian Personal Finance makes his CavRisk hosting debut with this week's roundup of risk-related pos...

Grand Rounds is up...

Julie Rosen presents this week's roundup of great medblog posts. As usual, it's an eclectic collection, but the underlying theme is patient-centered ca...

Passover 2011/5771

Passover is, at its heart, a celebration of freedom (although not necessarily liberation). Tonight, we celebrate the first night of this weeklong holiday, breaking bread (literally!) with people we know and love and, often, total strangers. May all our lives be blessed with freedom and liberati...

Big Blue Bites Back

What happens when the government decides to interfere with private industry in such a way as to make it more difficult for the employer to continue to operate or maintain a competitive edge?Private industry responds.Seems the folks in Vermont have their panties in a wad over IBM's reaction to the socialistic agenda of the state.IBM has responded by essentially saying, if this new world order of one...

Shecantbeserious hits bottom, keeps digging

It's becoming ever more difficult to take HHS Secretary Kathy Shecantbeserious, well, seriously. To wit:"We pay 2 1/2 times what anybody else pays in the world, and our care outcomes look like we're in a developing country.”Leaving aside the obvious logical disconnect inherent in that statement, to which 3rd world country is she referring? Great Britain? Canada? Sweden?She goes on to say that "(i)t...

Stupid Broker Tricks©: WC Edition

Kevin Sullivan runs the Rucking Insurance blog, where he writes about insurance and rugby ("rucking" is a rugby term having to do with ball possession). Inspired by our continuing Stupid Agent Tricks© series, Kevin has the sordid story of what happens when an agent betrays his client's trust. Recommend...

Buying Insurance Across State Lines

The GA legislature approved the sale of non-compliant health insurance, an incredibly stupid idea. Carriers approved to sell health insurance in Georgia will be allowed to offer plans approved in other states that have fewer mandates. The belief is this will create more choice and lower prices.They are wrong.With this passing, a company such as Cigna could offer a policy they sell in Texas to be sold...

Cavalcade of Risk #129: Call for submissions

Bob at Christian Personal Finance makes his CavRisk hosting debut with next week's edition. Submissions are due this Monday (the 18th), and Bob asks that you include:■ Your blog's url■ Your post's url■ The post's trackback URL (if available)■ A (brief) summary of the postAnd PLEASE remember: ONLY posts that relate to risk (not personal finance tips and the like).You can submit your post via Blog...

More than just Klingon

As if the last little "present" from Ms Shecantbeserious wasn't enough, there's a raft of new notices on its way to businesses which stubbornly continue to offer group health insurance. Here's a preview:"On March 31, several Federal agencies released for public comment various documents regarding Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). The central document includes the Proposed Rule released by the...