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March
2018
Legislative
Update by Robert S. Pastel, Esq
PIWA¡¯s
Legislative Representative
REMINDERS:
¡Ü The NY Premium Surplus Lines Tax
Deadline is MARCH 15, 2018.
¡Ü The PIWA Day on the Hill will be held
May 14-15, 2018. Stay tuned for details.
¡Ü Did you know PIWA
has a sample Brokerage Agreement for members? Click HERE
On the budget front, the Governor has
proposed including fines that specify insurance entities acting without a license
and to increase the fines on regulated entities to a minimum of $10,000 for
failure to pay a claim or making a false statement to the Superintendent.
(A.9507-A/S.5707-A.)
Senator Seward and Assemblyman Brindisi have
amended their proposals to allow for the insurability of punitive damages
(S.423-A/A.4753-A). The amendment removes personal lines and commercial auto,
and permits insuring punitive damages for vicarious liability.
PIWA supports legislation which provides CE
credits for belonging to producer organizations which have educational
components. S.3960 by Senator Seward, was reported to the floor of the Senate.
Assembly member Pamela Hunter (D-Syracuse) is sponsor of the bill in the
Assembly, A.7012.
PIWA also supports A.29 by Assemblyman Cahill
and S.422 by Senator Seward, which would remove the declination requirement of
the medical malpractice residual market mechanism prior to placing business in
the highly capitalized non-admitted market. These bills remain in their
respective insurance committees.
PIWA has concerns with A.8484/S.6445
requiring a uniform license date for all business entity licenses. These
bills would establish June 30 of odd-numbered years as the one common
expiration date for all business entity producer licenses. There can be
instances that the increased work load on DFS will prevent timely renewals if
centered into one expiration date. PIWA suggests that the uniform date is a
worthy goal, but suggests that its application be staggered throughout the
year. PIWA proposes leaving it up to the DFS to set up the dates on a unified
basis to stagger the workload, one suggestion is that DFS could divide the
licensees into quarters, so that ¨ù of the licensees could have concurrent
expiration dates. This could also extend help the CE providers who have once a
year rushes.
Legislation
to reestablish the NYC Fire Patrol, S.2604, was reported to the Senate Floor.
The Fire Patrol had limited usefulness, but was costly to maintain, since it
was funded out of assessments on insurance.