Monthly Archives: <span>September 2020</span>

Catastrophe Losses Driven Higher by Secondary Perils – And Climate Change

Secondary perils, exacerbated by climate change, are driving catastrophe insurance losses, warn a growing chorus of reinsurers and brokers. Indeed, broker Aon reveals that more than 60% of 2020’s insured catastrophe losses of $54 billion have been caused by secondary …

Texas Auto Insurance Plan Association Requests 4.8% Commercial Rate Hike

The Texas Automobile Insurance Plan Association (TAIPA) has filed a request with the Texas Department of Insurance to charge new insurance rates for commercial automobiles. The filed rates represent a 4.8% increase in commercial automobile rates. TAIPA proposed an effective …

Lockton Pacific Promotes Hostovich and Barnes in California

Lockton Insurance Brokers LLC, the Pacific region of global insurance broker Lockton Cos., has named Teena Hostovich vice chair of Lockton Pacific and Greg Barnes president of Greater Los Angeles. Barnes and Hostovich are based in Lockton’s Los Angeles office. …

Shopify Customer Data Likely Exposed by 2 Employees Attempting to Steal Records

Shopify Inc. said on Tuesday data of customers who shopped at fewer than 200 merchants listed on the company’s e-commerce platform was likely exposed after two employees tried to steal transaction records. The data exposed includes email, name, and address, …

Confident Russia Vows to Shoulder Some of the Legal Liability of Its COVID-19 Vaccine

Russia is so confident in its COVID-19 vaccine that it will shoulder some of the legal liability should anything go wrong, rather than requiring buyers to take on the full risk, the head of the state fund bankrolling the project …

Toyota Insurance in Europe Joins Swiss Re’s Vehicle Risk Rating System

Toyota is the newest partner in the Swiss Re platform that provides a risk score on vehicles so insurers can develop premiums that reflect new safety features. Through this partnership with Toyota Insurance Services (TIS)/Toyota Insurance Management Europe, Swiss Re …

Labor Department Eyes Simpler Rule for Classifying Independent Contractors

The U.S. Department of Labor on Tuesday said it would soon propose a rule that could make it easier to classify workers as independent contractors rather than employees, a major issue for the “gig economy” and other industries that use …

Arch Insurance Forms Single Managing Agency to Manage 4 Lloyd’s Operations

Arch Insurance International has formed Arch Managing Agency Limited to mange its Lloyd’s units. Arch Managing Agency Limited, which brings together Arch Underwriting at Lloyd’s and Barbican Managing Agency Ltd. into a single operation, will manage Syndicate 2012, Syndicate 1955, …

Copperpoint in Arizona Names Pytel Vice President, Marketing Chief

CopperPoint Insurance Cos. has named Thomas Pytel vice president, chief marketing and corporate communications officer. Pytel ‘s responsibilities include leading the marketing and communications functions for the CopperPoint family of insurance companies. He was most recently vice president, marketing and …

On Inland Crawl, Beta Dumps Heavy Rains, Floods Streets on Texas Coast

Beta weakened to a tropical depression on Sept. 22 as it crawled inland along the Texas coast south of Houston, unleashing heavy rains, flooding streets, and forcing emergency workers to rescue dozens of people. Rain submerged roads in the nation’s …