The National Association of Insurance Commissioners' (NAIC) has released its annual list of top consumer complaints, and as in recent years, the top three issues reported by consumers were dominated by claim-related issues.
According to the NAIC, the top three reasons consumers filed formal complaints against their insurance companies in 2008 were delays, denials of claims, and unsatisfactory settlement offers made by an insurer. These are the same issues that have dominated NAIC's study since 2006. There also is consistency in regards to the lines of insurance that garner the most consumer complaints. Accident and health ranks first, followed by auto, homeowners', life and annuity, and lastly commercial multi-peril.
A total of 195,669 confirmed consumer complaints on insurance companies were reported to the Complaint Database System (CDS) in the 2008 calendar year. The NAIC said that this information is based on the submission of data to them from the state insurance departments. The CDS is continually updated as new information is received from the states on an ongoing basis. The NAIC does not collect all complaint data from all states.
Top Five Reasons for Complaints in 2008
Claim-related issues dominated NAIC's list of consumer complaints by a wide margin. Below are the top issues, followed by the number of complaints received.
Delays
26,844
Denial of Claim
25,851
Unsatisfactory Settlement/Offer
20,021
Premium and Rating
6,644
Cancellation
5,618
More information is available at www.naic.org.
Interested in more education/training news and in-depth articles? Head over to Claims' education/training channel for more information.
Want to continue reading?
Become a Free PropertyCasualty360 Digital Reader
Your access to unlimited PropertyCasualty360 content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:
- Breaking insurance news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
- Weekly Insurance Speak podcast featuring exclusive interviews with industry leaders
- Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
- Critical converage of the employee benefits and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, BenefitsPRO and ThinkAdvisor
Already have an account? Sign In Now
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.