Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.
Henry David Thoreau
Being part of a successful business can often mean you’re busy focusing on the things that will bring you a profit. You go through your daily tasks and get told of the changes that are coming, or the plans that are about to roll out. Your new title may even be a part of the changes that are going to bring greater success to your company! But who’s making sure those changes are being reported to the appropriate people?
I work in the insurance industry, and each week I run across insurance agencies that (months ago) made internal changes, promoted a couple of people, brought in a new Vice President of Operations or Chief Financial officer, and revamped their internal processes. These new changes are going to help them tighten budgets, bring in more customers, and open new avenues for new product releases! From an agency stand point that’s great but what’s bad about what I described is…. they didn’t notify the Departments of Insurance of their changes. They were so busy being successful that they didn’t think about the ugly paperwork.
Did you know 35 of the States Departments of Insurance have a 30 – 60 day window notify of any changes to the Directors & Officers list?
Another issue we often see is an agency that has a call center, or something similar, and all the agents are licensed in states they’re doing business. When they’re licensed they tell the state they’re working for ABC Insurance Agency, but when they leave – the employer fails to tell the state they no longer work for them. Most states require you to notify them within 30 days when a licensed person’s employment has been terminated.
Here are a few things that you may be missing!
- Notifying the states when you update your Directors & Officers
- Notifying the states when you change your address & phone number (even if it’s just a suite down the hall)
- Updating Compliance Contact information
- Notifying the states of your name change if you recently married or divorced
- Notifying ALL states of administrative actions or other legal matters.
- Correctly surrendering unneeded licenses – especially Surplus Lines
- Withdrawing Business Registrations when leaving a state
Check out these other articles that discuss forgotten compliance tasks: