St. Paul Travelers: Ivan Cost $94 Million
NU Online News Service, Oct. 6, 4:24 p.m. EDT?St. Paul Travelers said its Hurricane Ivan losses hit $94 million today, while Allstate Corp. was busy denying Florida media reports that the insurance company is ceasing to write new homeowners policies in some parts of the state.[@@]
WKMG-TV in Orlando, Fla. and The Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville, Fla., as well as Associated Press wire service reported that Allstate, the third-largest provider of homeowners' insurance in Florida which has suffered heavy losses in this year's hurricane season--$425 million from Hurricane Charley alone--has decided to stop writing any homeowners policies in hard-hit counties in Florida.
St.Paul Travelers said its loss figure included $49 million for its commercial segment, $26 million from specialty business and $19 million from personal lines.
The company said those estimated losses are expected to reduce third quarter earnings per share by 14 cents and that the addition of two other hurricane losses would reduce earnings 45 cents a share.
The news stories about Allstate reported that in some other counties that are less affected by hurricanes, the Northbrook, Ill.-based company is writing only renters insurance or homeowners policies without windstorm coverage.
"But they misrepresented information. Certainly after our unprecedented storms, the whole industry has had to reexamine the property business in Florida, and everyone is trying to make appropriate business decisions," Deb Clouser, an Allstate representative in the Florida region, told National Underwriter. But she assured that Allstate is writing property products in Florida.
She noted, however, that since the company's focus now is meeting the needs of the existing customers in Florida, for new potential customers looking for homeowners' policies, "it will be decided on individual basis, based on their property needs and based on which counties they are from."
"We are doing our best to make property products available to customers, particularly the current Allstate Floridian customers," Ms. Clouser said.
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