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January 30, 2015

Weekly review for Law Practice Tips and Florida Insurance Law for January 30, 2015

Weekly Review for Miami Lawyer and Florida Legal News

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week related to law practice management, law technology, and legal marketing. Enjoy!

Legal Marketing Trends: Who are the 21st Century Companies Connecting Lawyers to Clients?
You may have heard of one or two or all three of the companies I will discuss. Some have huge investment dollars, others bootstrapping it. But each lend a unique value to the legal space and you should consider incorporating one or more platforms if their vision, ethics and toll structure work for you and your practice.

Read more here…

The Practice of Law: Developing a Peacemaking Law Practice
Rather than being a financial disaster, my decision to be a non-court unbundled lawyer has resulted in rapid growth of my practice beyond my most optimistic expectations. My gross receipts increased by over 33 percent during the first year following my decision not to accept litigation engagements. My uncollectable fees went down from 30 percent of gross billings to under two percent.

Read more here…

Legal Trends: Why Are So Many Lawyers Broke?
Many people don’t believe it. Even lawyers are known to scoff at it. But many of you know the truth — you go to law school, spend a small fortune and come out to find the pickings are lean.

Read more here…

Legal Industry Trends: 80% of Americans Can’t Afford Your Legal Fees
It’s 2015. The stock market is sky-rocketing towards the outer edges of our atmosphere. Sounds exhilarating when we see television’s talking heads bobbing apoplectically. We’ve even just started a calendar year that ends in ‘5′ and rumor has it that every year that has ended in ‘5′, the stock market has gone up around 23% on average. Wow!

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Law Practice Tips and Florida Insurance Law!

January 12, 2015

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Monday, January 12, 2015

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Flood insurance rates in Florida to spike for some properties
NON-PRIMARY RESIDENCES ARE GOING TO BE SEEING AN INCREASE IN THEIR PREMIUMS FOR PROTECTION AGAINST FLOODING – Although owners of primary residences have been breathing a sigh of relief over recent flood insurance news, the story for owners of rental properties and vacation homes will soon be quite different.

Read more here…

Florida’s Citizens Drops Coverage Limits on High-Value Properties
Florida’s state-backed property insurer is lowering the amount of coverage it provides for high-value properties from $1 million to $900,000, per a 2013 law change. Citizens Property Insurance Corp. is implementing the change that will apply to all almost all new and renewal high-value business as of January 1.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

January 2, 2015

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Friday, January 2, 2015

week's weekly review for Florida Insurance Law

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Florida’s Universal Insurance Raises $19M in Stock Deal
Florida’s largest private insurer has raised $19 million through a privately negotiated stock deal with an investment firm that specializes in natural catastrophe reinsurance and weather risk.

Read more here…

What you need to know about Florida’s new child safety seat laws
According to the Florida Highway Patrol, 145 Florida children have been injured this year because of improper child restraints. Parents who violate the new law face fines of $60 and 3 points on their license.

Read more here…

New Florida Law for Smoke Alarms
In an attempt to reduce deaths from house fires, the Florida Building Code will now require homeowners to install a 10-year, sealed battery smoke alarm in the home when replacing outdated or nonworking alarms.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

December 22, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Monday, December 22, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Florida Legal News: Tampa Couple Wins Harassment Lawsuit Against Bank of America for $1Million+
Nelson and Joyce Coniglio of Tampa, Florida were tired of receiving a flood of automated phone calls (over 700) from the Bank of America after they fell behind in the mortgage payments in 2009. They got a lawyer, filed a lawsuit against the Bank, and they recently got a judgment of $1,051,000 against the bank. Their lawyer, Billy Howard, discusses the case.

Read more here…

Florida Legal News: Florida Cop Pulls Man Over For Playing Anti-Police Song By N.W.A.
Cesar Baldelomar, a Harvard graduate, claims that he was pulled over by a police officer in Hialeah, Florida, on Thanksgiving morning. Baldelomar was playing the classic 1988 rap tune “F— Tha Police” by N.W.A. However, Hialeah Police Officer Harold Garzon was standing nearby when he heard the anti-police lyrics from Baldelomar’s car.

Read more here…

Florida Legal News: Florida employers launch campaign for statewide LGBT anti-discrimination law
Florida employers, responding to rising public support, today unveiled Florida Competes, a campaign to persuade state legislators to update anti-discrimination laws.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

December 15, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Monday, December 15, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Florida Legal News: Is Jan. 6 Florida’s day for gay marriage?
Come Jan. 6, Florida may become the 36th state in which same-sex couples can go to their local county clerk’s office and get a marriage license.
Or Florida might become Kansas — a Balkanized state where some county clerks issue licenses, some won’t, and the whole issue of gay marriage is confused and unsettled.

The reason: A July memo from top law firm Greenberg Traurig advising its clients — the state association of county clerks — that if a state or federal judge threw out Florida’s gay-marriage ban the ruling would apply only to the parties in the lawsuit — not the whole state.

Read more here…

Florida Insurance Law: Flood insurance generates more controversy in the US
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will be examining whether or not it has the ability to force insurance companies to disclose information regarding the potential manipulation of flood insurance claims related to 2012’s Hurricane Sandy. The powerful storm battered the eastern United States, causing some $68 billion in damage, making it the second costliest hurricane in the country’s history. In the wake of the storm, many insurers have come under fire because of delayed claims payments and rejecting claims.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

December 5, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Friday, December 5, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Florida Company Reaches $40M Settlement Over Illegal Fax Ads
A Jacksonville-based company has reached a $40 million settlement in a class action lawsuit over claims the company sent unsolicited fax advertisements to consumers.

A federal judge will still need to approve the settlement by Interline Brands Inc. over charges that it violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which prohibits companies from sending fax ads to customers it doesn’t already do business with.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

November 21, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Friday, November 21, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Switching to a Cheaper Property Insurance Company? Better Think Twice
Over the past few months, many Citizens Property Insurance policy holders received a notification that, unless they opted out within a certain time frame, their property insurance would be automatically transferred out of Citizens and into one of several small start-up insurance companies. These newly formed property insurance carriers have been nick-named “take-out” companies because their sole source of new business is to take over property insurance policies that have been transferred out of Citizens.

This process has created a love/love relationship between Citizens and these new insurance companies as, through the transfer of policies out of Citizens and into these new start-ups, Citizens can further its goal of depopulating its customer base and the new start-ups get “free” customers without having to market for same.

Read more here…

Florida Gov. Scott Facing Rising Seas, Climate Change Politics
When Florida Governor Rick Scott won re-election Nov. 4, he triumphed over both his Democratic challenger and California billionaire Thomas Steyer, who spent $20 million painting him as a climate-change denier.

Scott, a 61-year-old Republican who during the campaign deflected questions about the topic by asserting that he isn’t a scientist, has little time to celebrate.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

November 3, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Monday, November 3, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Insurance industry may be woefully unprepared for climate change
Ceres, an environmental investor advocacy group, has released the results of a new surveyit has conducted in the insurance industry. According to the survey, the majority of U.S. insurance companies are woefully unprepared to handle the risks associated with climate change. While many insurers have been relatively cavalier with their claims that not enough is being done to mitigate climate change, several companies have done little to prepare themselves for future environmental risks.

According to the survey, only 10% of insurers operating in the U.S. have made public climate change management statements, offering information about what these companies plan to do about the issue. These companies have made little to no effort to showcase the steps they are taking to make use of climate risk management programs or how they are approaching core underwriting and investment issues that could be influenced by a changing climate.

Read more here…

Florida Approves Up to 183K Takeouts from Citizens for 2015
The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation (OIR) has approved the removal of up to 180,040 personal residential policies and 2,527 commercial residential polices from Citizens Property Insurance Corp.

The OIR said these are the first take-outs approved for 2015.

The number approved for takeout is not necessarily the number that will actually be removed from Citizens. In 2014, the total number of policies approved for take-outs was 1,109,644 while the actual number of policies removed from Citizens this year as of September 18, 2014 is 127,550, according to OIR.

By statute, policyholders may choose to remain covered by Citizens during take-out offers; however, they may be at risk of higher assessments if they stay with Citizens.

The approvals for 2015 involve the following nine companies…Read more here.

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!

October 17, 2014

Weekly Review for Florida Insurance Law for Friday, October 17, 2014

Here are some recent articles of interest that I found this week for the insurance industry, Florida insurance law, Florida insurance claims, and Florida insurance trends. Enjoy!

Florida Insurance Law: Atlantic Hurricane Season Could Still Surprise
As weather-watchers focus on Typhoon Vongfong in the Pacific and Cyclone Hudhud in the Bay of Bengal, a subtropical depression has formed south of Bermuda late last week, prompting a tropical storm watch there.

With maximum winds of 35 miles (56 kilometers) per hour, the system was 590 miles south of Bermuda, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami. A storm gets a name when its winds reach 39 mph.

While one potential system may be enough to give pause, there are clues that larger storm-friendly environmental forces such as the Madden-Julian Oscillation and a Kelvin wave are coming together across the basin, said Dan Kottlowski, a hurricane forecaster at AccuWeather Inc.

“That’s why the season lasts until late November,” Kottlowski said.

Fortunately, the pieces are coming together a month after the Atlantic season’s statistical peak, at a time when the heat is draining out of the tropics. An alignment like this a month ago might have provided fuel for a severe outbreak.

Read more here…

Thank you for reading (and sharing). Stay tuned for next week’s weekly review for Florida Insurance Law!