Archives for June, 2017

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No Comments June 27th, 2017 Commercial Property, Latest News, Storm Preparation

Preparing For The Next Hurricane Wilma Before It Hits

Almost a decade has passed since a devastating hurricane has hit the Southeast, memories still haunt many commercial real estate owners. Now, hurricane season is upon us again.

Globest.com caught up with Jason Wolf, a shareholder at Koch Parafinczuk Wolf Susen in Fort Lauderdale how property owners and managers whose careers began in the region in the past 10 years should prepare for the storm season. We also asked him about the repercussions that are totally unfamiliar.

GlobeSt.com: Hurricanes in 2004, 2005 and 2008 wreaked havoc on the Southeast. How bad was it?

Wolf: Katrina, Rita and Wilma were Category 5 hurricanes and Dennis was a Category 3 storm that together caused $153 billion in damage in 2005. Those figures blew past a record set the year before, when four hurricanes tore through Florida and headed north, causing $57 billion in damage. In 2008, damage from Ike totaled $37.5 billion.

GlobeSt.com: What was the effect on insurance companies?

Wolf: The storms created dire consequences on many insurance companies. Insurers stopped writing policies in states such as Florida and Louisiana, premiums skyrocketed, and restrictions proliferated. Although for the most part, the market has recovered, property and casualty policies now have multiple exclusions and higher deductibles.

GlobeSt.com: How has that affected property owners and managers?

Wolf: The impact has made it nearly impossible for property owners and managers to know what’s covered and what’s not without sitting down with their insurance agent. This applies to everyone, by the way. For anyone who has survived, there may be a tendency to get a little smug, thinking “I know what to do” In fact, the insurance industry has changed significantly in the past 12 years, and so has property coverage.

GlobeSt.com: What are the first steps a property manager or develop should take?

Wolf: Property managers should sit down with their agents and review each policy. Find out the basics: What’s covered and what’s not? What’s the deductible? Are hurricanes explicitly covered?

For example, in some coverage for hurricanes, the deductible can be up to 7% of total. On a $10 million property, that’s $700,000. Property managers and insurance professionals should total the dollar amounts on the main policy and other policies that address windstorm, flood, storm surge and wind-driven rain. But policies have different types of exclusions. Read your policy! And if you can’t understand, it, talk to your agent or your insurance company.

 

Source: GlobeSt.

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No Comments June 20th, 2017 Latest News, Other Commercial Lines

Preparing And Making The Right Trucking Insurance Decisions To Protect Your Investment

Whether you are a trucking start-up or a seasoned small carrier, insurance is both a necessity and a nuisance with which to be reckoned.

More times than not a carrier’s owner isn’t as prepared as needed with the necessary information required for the lowest insurance quote. Many small and micro-carriers request quotes when their insurance is renewing in just a few days or weeks. That in itself creates a challenge for the insurance agent to gather the required underwriting information about the carrier, package it to fit the different criteria of the multitude of insurance companies, and provide the time for insurance underwriters to return a quote with their best rates. Trucking company owners need to know that to get the lowest possible rates, an insurance company requires both time and detailed information about the carrier.

This is not like calling your local car and home insurance agent, or going online to enter personal information to receive a quote for your car. For trucking insurance, you’re talking about a multitude of risks that need to be evaluated to determine the best coverage at the lowest cost.

To do this and to ensure no coverage is left out and unnecessary coverage is excluded requires time. The typical length of time spent gathering the underwriting information from the carrier, packaging the information in the required format for each underwriter, and then providing those underwriters with the time necessary to assemble a quality quote is two to three months.

If your insurance agent hasn’t contacted you 90 to 120 days out from your renewal date or if you are a start-up carrier, you need to contact the agent 120 days from the date you are officially opening for business. Anything short of that and you will most likely pay far more than you should for your motor carrier’s insurance.

What follows is a list of the detailed information you should be providing to your insurance agent. It’s best to have it packaged and ready to go. When insurance companies ask for documents, the faster they are produced indicates you’re on top of your company’s business and financial situation.

Keep in mind there may be other documents and information required for special situations and operations, so verify with your insurance agent what he or she needs.

GENERAL INFORMATION

– A list of drivers, including license numbers, dates of birth, and dates of hire.
– A copy of current safety program and any incentive program.
– A list of primary customers.
– Current company financial statements.
– Three- to five-year-loss runs with details on any large losses.
– An updated business plan.
– Website address as well as any brochures, newspaper articles, etc., that describe insured’s operations.

PROPERTY

– A list of all facilities (buildings, tank capacity, etc.)
– Is vehicle repair or body work done on premises?
– Is fuel stored on premises? Describe type, amount, and storage.
– Are fuel pumps and tanks protected by concrete posts?
– Is the yard area fully fenced and lit at night?

GENERAL LIABILITY

– Are you involved in other operations besides trucking for hire?
– Are you involved in any warehousing of goods for others?
– Are drivers allowed to carry guns?

AUTO LIABILITY

– What type of carrier is your company, i.e., common, contract, exempt, or private?
– List the types and percentage of hauling done for each (van, reefer, flatbed, liquid, etc.).
– Describe in detail what commodities are hauled.
– List major cities insured served and give percentage of overall operations to each.
– Does insured ever haul into or out of Canada or Mexico?
– Are any federal or state filings required?
– Are special filings (oversized, overweight, etc.) required?
– Is your company involved in any intermodal shipping?
– Does your company haul double or triple trailers? If yes, list percentage of each.
– Do you act as a freight broker/forwarder or arrange loads for others?
– Do you hire equipment from others?
– Do you hire contract lease operators under your authority?
– Is your company named as additional insured on its policies?
– Do you or your contract lease operators require non-trucking coverage (bobtail)?
– Is equipment ever loaned or leased to others? With or without drivers?
– Is your trucking company responsible for primary auto liability coverage?
– Do any contract lease operators need to be named as an ‘additional insured’?
– Is your carrier party to a formal interchange agreement?
– What is your carrier’s policy regarding passengers riding in trucks?
– Do you operate any vehicles that may need downtime coverage?
– Describe the current maintenance program for trucks and equipment.
– Are any vehicles altered, customized or have special equipment?
– Are all trucks equipped with fire extinguishers?
– Describe driver hiring, training and safety programs employed by insured.
– Are drivers assigned to specific trucks? Do drivers perform daily inspections?
– Are motor vehicle reports (MVRs) obtained for all new drivers? Are annual MVRs run for all existing drivers?
– What percentage of drivers are employees versus contract lease operators?
– Are any drivers under 25 years old? Over 65 years old?
– What are the maximum number of hours driven daily and weekly by drivers?
– Are pre-employment physicals required for all new drivers?

 

Source: American Trucker

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No Comments June 13th, 2017 Commercial Property, Latest News, Storm Preparation

Four Steps To Prepare Your Small Business For Hurricane Season

While Hurricane Matthew may still be fresh in the minds of many local small business owners, forecasters warn this year’s hurricane season may be worse than normal.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association predicts five to nine hurricanes, two to four of which could be Category 3 or higher. Hurricane season lasts from June 1 through Nov. 30.

Small business are particularly vulnerable to the high costs of weather damages. Almost 40 percent never reopen after a disaster, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Ed Bides, information security officer and disaster recovery team member at Florida Capital Bank, offers four practical ways to ensure your business is prepared for Mother Nature.

1. Know What You Have

Catalog computers, equipment and other property as well as files and important documents. Keep a digital copy of this list, photograph important equipment and back up your documents using a cloud service.

2. Check Your Insurance Policies

Do you need business interruption coverage? Will your insurance pay what your old equipment is worth now or what it will cost you to buy new equipment? Carefully consider what your policies will do for you, and make sure you have all the coverage you need.

3. Plan Ahead

Develop a plan for how to prepare your business and personnel for severe weather. Remember that your employees will need time to prepare their homes and pick up children from school in the case of an evacuation. “There’s always room to improve,” said Bides, noting that Florida Capital Bank modifies its plan every year. Communicate your plan, so everyone is on the same page when you need them to be.

4. Know Your Disaster Recovery Options

Check the Small Business Administration website after a disaster to see if your business is in a disaster relief zone and eligible for funds.

 

Source: SFBJ

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No Comments June 6th, 2017 Commercial Property, Latest News, Storm Preparation

New Hurricane Advisories To Give Storm Preparation Deadlines

Some coastal residents always put off emergency preparations until storm clouds loom on the horizon.

The National Hurricane Center is going to try giving those people a deadline this year, issuing experimental advisories showing when tropical-storm force winds may hit particular communities to help them understand when it’s too late to put up storm shutters or evacuate.

The forecasters’ advisories will be fueled by more data than ever, thanks to new weather satellites and an expanded network of underwater gliders.

To help people understand when storm preparations should be completed, the hurricane center will experiment with advisories showing the times when sustained tropical-storm force winds are estimated to hit land. If a tropical disturbance nears shore, forecasters also could post advisories or warnings before it develops into a tropical depression or named storm.

 “The new advisories could help validate evacuation orders for people who complain about hype around approaching storms,”’ Florida’s emergency management director,” Bryan Koon, said “We can say, listen, this is when things are going to get bad in your area. We can also use that to say, a few hours ahead of that, stores are going to close, roads are going to get jam-packed with people, we might have to shut down power substations.”

Storm surge watches and warnings will be issued when U.S. coastlines are at risk for life-threatening flooding.

Shrinking Cone

The “uncertainty cone” showing a storm’s projected path shrinks again this year, with continued improvements in track forecasts. It’s still the best-known advisory released by the hurricane center, but forecasters continue to emphasize individual hazards away from the center of a storm.

On his last day as hurricane center director before returning to The Weather Channel, Rick Knabb said better data and better computer models help create a narrower cone. But that can give a false sense of security to areas outside the cone.

“Hurricane watches and warnings can extend well outside the cone. In fact, the hurricane itself can be much larger than the width of the cone,” Knabb said. “So clearly a hurricane is not just a point on the map. Forecasters will add an outline of a storm’s wind field to the graphic to help people see hurricane impacts beyond the cone.”

Intensity Forecasts

Predicting the intensity of a storm remains a challenge. Apart from improving public communications about storm hazards, the hurricane center also has been working to improve its forecasts predicting when and how much a storm will strengthen.

“It’s difficult to measure what’s happening around a hurricane’s eye – where the strongest winds swirl – or how it interacts with the ocean and the atmosphere, and that affects the accuracy of storm intensity forecasts,” said Dan Brown, a senior hurricane specialist at the Hurricane Center in Miami. “It’s a combination of everything, but oftentimes, it’s understanding what the structure of the storm is and getting that right when the computer models are first run.”

Forecasting Technology

More and better data will be streaming into those models this year, which forecasters hope will help improve their predictions for a hurricane’s intensity.

NASA launched eight mini-satellites in December to measure surface winds deep in the hearts of hurricanes. Unlike other weather satellites, the $157 million Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System can give scientists a clear look into a hurricane’s eye even through walls of clouds and rain.

Forecasters said the $1 billion GOES-16 weather satellite, launched in November, is as significant an upgrade as switching to high-definition television, with more detailed images and more channels looking at storms.

To keep up with higher resolution forecast models, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has upgraded the Doppler radar on its hurricane hunter aircraft to give scientists a more detailed look at hurricane winds.

NOAA again will launch four underwater gliders from Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands to collect ocean data, and this summer the agency will expand its data pool by collaborating with universities and research institutions in the U.S. and Bermuda that have up to 20 their own gliders in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic.

 “Glider data has helped improve the models’ understanding of the ocean,” said Gustavo Goni, director of the physical oceanography division at NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory. “We want to put all these efforts together to make a better analysis.”

 

Source: Claims Journal

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