Comment:

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Ken,

    Not only do I welcome the PUBLIC forum and comments from these insurance sales people, but I am happy to see them come out of the shadows of their customers who have been shills for them in this forum for so many years raising issues about SARRG.

    For many years the insurance agents have spoken against SARRG in the competitive arena trying to justify why their, more times than not, higher price insurance is the best choice. First it was that SARRG was not admitted, even though they all have admitted and non-admitted products. Second was that we were not rated by A.M. Best, so we went out and got rated, which turned out to be one of the highest debuts for an RRG in a rating process to our knowledge. Now its our rating is not good enough. Blah blah blah.

    Here is the undisputed truths, First Mercury had very poor operational results and they were, in my opinion, saved when taken over by Fairfax. This takeover by Fairfax was done before the professionals at A.M. Best had the opportunity to down grade the rating, which now says under review with positive implications. Moody’s raised its outlook on First Mercury, again, only after the merger.

    This does not remove the issue that the policies written by First Mercury have devastating exclusions for any alarm company covered by First Mercury. In a recent quote that I saw, contained exclusions for medical facilities and private response services. This means that if you have any type of system (Burg, Fire, Access, CCTV, etc) in a medical facility, you have no coverage! For private response, if your customer is in a no response jurisdiction and your central station calls a private response company, you have no coverage regardless if the response agent is armed or not.   

    Other posted comments, such as from Larry St John, were in fact very fair and balanced, such as when he said, “proven gauge of an insurer’s future claim-paying ability is its financial rating” from A.M. Best, is correct. What needs to be considered and I challenge the other insurers to divulge when the last time they paid a full limit loss in their program! Truth be told is that we at SARRG was looking for industry loss runs to evaluate what the true cost of being an insurer for our narrow industry, is that losses are very very small and have continued that way. Our re-insurance costs have gone down and our rates have adjusted accordingly. If anybody’s rates have increased in the last 6 years with no adverse claims, then the only thing I can assume is that your being abused.

    Mike Kelly wants to scare your readers with unfounded liabilities and want the buyer to asses the value of dealing with a big company over SARRG in the unlikely event that you get a claim. The financial strength of SARRG is more than sufficient for the government regulators, our current reinsurers, our old reinsurers (who wants us to come back)  and A.M. Best. Please remember it was our competition that said we were not reliable because we were not rated, now SARRG is rated as “Good” and good is not good enough.

    Karen Izzo said, “its frustrating to read Bart question the financial stability of Hartford or Scottsdale when they have billions in assets”. Hey Karen, so did AIG who got bailed out, but what about Kemper, Frontier, Superior National, Reliant (I guess not so Reliant) and legion? My response is that insurance companies that offer a  broad range of coverage’s are not safe for that reason alone. SARRG is managed by industry professionals who understand the exposures first hand while being teamed up with the best attorneys who have defended the contracts time and time again that limits the exposure so that an insurance company such as SARRG can do the right thing by its policy holders.

    Not surprisingly, but Alice was the class act in the response to my statements. Alice said that, “SARRG has the same DNA as the” other companies we have been discussing” and that RRG’s “are every bit unstable, long-term, as the” major companies. Alice goes on to ask, “Can SARRG guarantee their solvency any stronger than any other carrier?”, the answer is no, not any stronger.

    Ken, here is our position, our challenge and our future. Our position is that SARRG has been the sole competitive force in holding down the rates of all the other GL/E&O programs in the industry for the last six plus years. Our challenge is to quote every alarm company that reads these e-mails. Most will save money, some will not and very few we will decline to quote to, but when we just saved one company 27% (almost 5,000.00 dollars) over First Mercury, your readers have to ask themselves, is it really in my best interests to have all of my coverage’s with one office when I can save that kind of money? As to the future of SARRG, if we double the number of companies we cover and our customers continue at the current loss runs, we will become an “A” rated company. What are the others going say then?

    Your readers should also consider this, even when ADT lost the NJ decision for half of an 8 million dollar loss, they appealed and paid nothing but attorney fees because they have a proper contract. SARRG would have taken the same actions as ADT for any of our own insureds. In fact one of our attorneys used to be the ADT Corporate Council. You only have as much insurance as you buy, but your attorney, your contracts and insurance company are priceless when it comes to your ability to remain in business after a claim.

    Our new motto should be – Don’t be a dope – just get a quote!

Bart A. Didden

Executive Claims Manager

Security America Risk Retention Group – SARRG

www.securityamericarrg.com

866-315-8686

 

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The below comment was sent in by Bart before the above comment.  Since I already had this one scheduled I decided to send it.

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Ken,

    Let’s talk INSURANCE, PRICING and EXCLUSIONS.

    Now many people in the industry have made faces and subjected SARRG to the craziest scrutiny that any insurance company has seen in this industry. Our competition has tried to do everything possible to raise suspicion and doubt. Well not it is my turn to do it right back.

    SARRG recently did a quote comparison to a quote from a big insurance company, here are the interesting results –

    Exclusions – the other carrier excluded all of the following – Since August of 2004 “Exclusion Residential Developments & Condominiums”, and “Exclusion of Specific Work”, which included “Any and all operations involving physical, private security response or private dispatch to a Subscriber’s premises subsequent to and resulting from the receipt of an alarm signal at the monitoring service”. As well as, “Any and all operations involving or arising out of the installation, service, repair or monitoring of alarm or alarm systems at medical facilities or penal institutions”.

    Discussion on exclusions – If you have any business activity in a community with your own or contracted private response agents, even if they are unarmed, there is no coverage. So if more communities go non-response where you are, you have a growing liability exposure because your sending a private response agent. SARRG policy holders do have an exclusion for armed personnel only.

    If you have systems in hospitals, clinics, nursing homes even doctor’s offices, no coverage. Even if your fire system is contracted by the building owner and there is a clinic as a tenant, the exclusion is worded so broadly, there is no coverage. The residential development and condominiums does not even deserve a discussion, just don’t install or maintain the required fire alarm systems, because you’re not covered under this policy SINCE 2004.

    Insurance – The other insurance company is an “A” rated company and the installing company has some municipal contracts that required a “rated” carrier with 6 million limits. After some painless inquiry, all of the municipal customers where just fine with the “B++” rating from A.M. Best for SARRG.

    Pricing – The applicant was an existing ESA member, but did receive extra credits for proper contracts (K&K) and being part of the First Alert Professional program from Honeywell. In the end the SARRG quote was 26% less based on over 3 million in gross receipts.  The real savings for this alarm company was over $5,000.00.

    Just because the other insurance companies are big, bigger or the biggest, does not mean that they are better. Call your company and see if your policy has these exclusions. It’s your responsibility to know what you’re buying.

Bart A. Didden

Executive Claims Manager

Security America Risk Retention Group – SARRG

Over 750 low voltage contractors covered

www.securityamericarrg.com

866-315-3838