News

You probably didn’t notice that I was away from the office last week – which is a good thing. The family and I took another ‘Explore America’ vacation only this time without the tricked out motor home. We headed north to visit some of the wild and remote areas of New England and the northern Atlantic coast. We hiked Mt. Washington (the windiest place in the U.S.) and visited beautiful Acadia National Park where we spotted several humpback whales. It is hard to describe the chill you feel in your bones when you see those amazing creatures and think how their existence validates your own.

You know, so often we think about the opportunities we give our kids – education, travel, a good home… but I am convinced it is the other way around. My kids have given me the opportunity to be more and see more than I ever would have without them. Take some time for yourself this summer to see the world through a child’s eyes and see if it doesn’t change you.

While I was away you probably heard that the Dodd-Frank Bill aka the Financial Services Reform legislation was passed and signed into law. Did you know that our industry gets to lay claim to 10 whole pages of the Act? After years of trying to make sense of multi-state surplus lines insurance risks, the Nonadmitted and Reinsurance Reform Act of 2009 (NRRA) was finally passed. What does this mean to you? Well, writing insurance for your large commercial accounts with multiple state locations will get infinitely simpler. In the past, when you wrote an account with multi-state locations, there were competing interests among the states. Now compliance is accomplished through meeting the requirements of the insured’s home state. That means just one filing, one affidavit and one tax rate. Yeah!

Making things simple is always our goal at Tuscano. I just read an article about how people will often prefer to go to an airline kiosk to print their boarding pass rather than to a check-in counter even when there is no line! It is the same with an ATM over a live teller. We have slowly but surely become accustomed to, and actually prefer self-service options over live customer support. Some might feel this is the end of building business relationships, but I disagree. I think what is important is that whatever channel the customer chooses, they have a clear path to the desired outcome. In other words, it better work! If you have a difficult risk and feel one-on-one with an underwriter will work best, please pick up the phone, because we love hearing from you. If you want to get a quick quote on a vacant dwelling, consider going to our website and using our online rater. Both options work great.

I’d like to wrap up with a plug for our Allied Healthcare and related products. We have markets that are looking to write this business and our quote to bind ratio is better than average. If you have an Assisted Living or Nursing Home risk coming up - give Deb, Dina, Tim or Robin a call, OR go online and check out the info on our Allied Medical product page!

Have it your way at Tuscano!