Insurance News

Smart ways to reduce your car insurance costs

admin — Wed, 18 May 2011 16:17:35 +0000

While some factors are beyond your control, these tips can help you lower your bill. Link

By Sheryl Nance-Nash

DailyFinance

Insuring the Theft of Your Business Data

admin — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 17:55:31 +0000

The stories of breached data security have become almost too familiar: An employee takes home a laptop against regulations. A hard drive is sent out for repair, but disappears. A disc with sensitive data is stolen from an office. For business owners and managers, the threat is real, and there is a need to protect against such violations of data security.

Big businesses are not the only targets of data theft. Doctor’s offices, retail shops, contractors, salespeople, and most other professions store personal information electronically. Sometimes, businesses that lose personal information are victims of sophisticated hacking schemes concocted by the most crafty computer cons. More often, data theft comes from the inside—a dishonest employee seeking wealth or a disgruntled employee seeking revenge. Regardless of culprit, victims, including employees, customers and others shoulder the risk of someone else’s access to their information.

Information stolen from your business can result in significant costs, including the following:

Expenses you incur to inform those who may be victims of the theft.
Expenses you incur to replace the data and income lost during the recovery process.
Victims will incur expenses to recover lost information and expect you to pay for it.
Victims will likely no longer do business with you, resulting in lost income.
Victims who suffer financial losses resulting from identity theft may sue you for their damages.
Personnel may lose confidence in you and seek employment elsewhere.

Traditional insurance products—such as general liability, property, business income and crime insurance—are designed to cover losses to tangible property. Since information is intangible, the insurance your business currently buys will not go far in covering this exposure.

Some insurance companies have created products to address data theft that occurs electronically, such as when someone uses a computer to steal electronic data. These policies may cover costs you incur to restore the data, including lost income. Others may cover liability, helping you cover costs incurred by others who are victimized by the theft of your data. Such policies are often called “Cyber Risk” or “Cyber Insurance” policies.

Data theft and the unpredictable methods by which it can happen are why there is no substitute for an effective data security plan. Call your Trusted Choice^® independent insurance agent for information on how a cyber insurance policy could fit your business.

Heartman Insurance is a local Trusted Choice^® agency that represents multiple insurance companies, so it offers you a variety of personal and business coverage choices and can customize an insurance plan to meet your specialized needs. You can contact Heartman Insurance online at http://www.heartman.com or call it at 507-288-3834.

Firms lose more to electronic than physical theft

admin — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:51:01 +0000

Survey shows electronic fraud exceeding physical theft. Link

By Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent

Reuters

Texting ban has unintended consequences

admin — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 15:46:47 +0000

Rather than not texting, many of us are simply hiding the cell phone below sight level when we text while driving. Link

McCook Daily Gazette

Safety advocates push for tougher national teen driver laws

admin — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 19:42:31 +0000

WASHINGTON — Flanked by family members and other victims of teen traffic accidents, highway safety advocates took to Capitol Hill on Tuesday to call for passage of proposed federal legislation that would put tough limits on drivers under age 18. Link

By Bob Keefe

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Auto insurers’ group: Texting bans do not reduce crashes

admin — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 18:19:14 +0000

Texting bans do not reduce car crashes and may make the problem slightly worse, according to a report from researchers at the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI), a group that works on behalf of the auto insurance industry. Link

By Sara Jerome

The Hill

Closed Roads and Sandbagging: 10″ of Rain Swamps S. Minnesota

admin — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 19:18:45 +0000

Flash-flood warnings are in effect for a broad swath of southern Minnesota, where some roads are impassable and schools have closed so students can help with sandbagging. Link

David Joles, Star Tribune

Trafic Deaths at Lowest in 60 Years

admin — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 18:46:37 +0000

http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2010-09-09-1Aroaddeaths09_ST_N.htm

Life Insurance Doesn’t Have to be Complicated

admin — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 19:15:36 +0000

This week an insurance research firm reported that ownership in life insurance has reached a 50-year low, with nearly a third of U.S. households not having a form of this financial protection. As the benefits industry begins Life Insurance Awareness Month in September, Unum (NYSE: UNM) shares the concern that this decline exposes working Americans to financial uncertainty.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/200112.php

NOAA trims tropical storm forecast but still sees active season.

admin — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 19:15:08 +0000

http://www.businessinsurance.com/article/20100805/NEWS01/100809959