The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation “OIR” is required by Florida Statute §624.313 to publish statistics and ratios on the complaints consumers submit against insurance companies. Its primary responsibility is regulation, compliance and enforcement of statutes relating to the business of insurance and the monitoring of industry markets. Florida Statute requires the OIR to annually publish several categories of information about the insurance companies doing business in Florida. When the 2010 report was released in February 2011, the report tabulated data on Consumer Complaints against insurance companies from complaints lodged in 2009 only.
Florida Statute § 624.313 requires the OIR to publish complaint ratios for the 10 largest insurers or insurer groups by line of insurance for each insurer or insurer group that has one percent or more of the market share.
While this information is readily available in the report, as a consumer, this information can be difficult to find and requires a very detailed review of each company. It can be difficult to digest and compare.
Recently, I was provided a summary of the complaint information in the 2010 report that is more reader friendly.
Complaint Statistics
Calendar Year 2009
Of the insurers who write a significant amount of homeowner business in Florida, which ones have more than their share of complaints and which have fewer? The attached table ranks the 50 insurers (out of 218 total) who wrote the most homeowner insurance in Florida in 2009. Together the 50 companies wrote nearly 90% of the Florida homeowner premiums. They are ranked by their 2009 "Complaint Index." A Complaint Index of more than 1.00 means that the company’s complaint share was higher than its market share, which is negative. A Complaint Index of less than 1.00 means that the company had a lower complaint share than its market share, which is positive. Three companies that have gone into run off or been liquidated since 2009 have been deleted from this list.
The OIR gives additional information on how it calculated its rankings:
For purposes of this complaint index reporting:
“Complaint Share” is the number of complaints received by the Office relative to the insurance industry expressed as a percentage.
“Complaint” is any written communication by an insured or named beneficiary
expressing dissatisfaction with an insurance entity over which the Office has regulatory authority. This does not include complaints against an incorrect entity; complaints against companies providing administrative services for self-funded benefit plans; complaints for properly filed or approved rates; suspected fraudulent claim complaints; and complaints that are duplicative or frivolous. The Office extracts these numbers from the NAIC database; the NAIC receives the data from the Department of Financial Services, and standardizes the definition of complaints across 50 states.“Market Share” is the company’s direct written premium relative to the industry for a given line of insurance. The report expresses this ratio as a percentage.
“Premiums” are consideration paid to an insurer for the issuance and delivery of any binder or policy of insurance or annuity written directly to the consumer.
“Complaint Index” is a ratio derived by dividing a company’s complaint share by its market share.
A complaint index of greater than 1.00 indicates the company’s complaint share is disproportionately higher than its market share for a specific line of insurance.
A complaint index of less than 1.00 indicates the company’s complaint share is a disproportionately lower than its market share for a specific line of insurance.
