It has been an eventful advocacy and issues-arising time in our sector. Having promised to keep you posted on developments, I’ve prepared this one-stop-shop update on all the various fires we’re fighting and some smoke we see on the horizon. I’ll start with the most recent….
The above link will take you to the full report. The general themes in the report line up with David Marshall’s report(s) and hint at auto insurance changes likely waiting in the wings. There’s a lot here of interest to us. On an initial read the following recommendations to FSRA jump out. Underline and italics are mine.
More MIG?
Implement up-to-date programs of care for injuries such as sprains, strains and whiplash to standardize treatment provided after an accident and the costs of such treatment, beyond just those of minor injuries; An expansion of the MIG approach to more serious injuries? Yikes.
DAC Comeback?
Assess the cost of a centralized medical assessment process requiring both insurers and consumers to use the process to reduce medical assessments and disputes related to those assessments; Are the Designated Assessment Centres (DECs) coming back from the dead?
Auto Bodies to Get the Regulatory Gaze?
Develop an accreditation regime for automobile repair shops; This is long overdue. At least there would be a better balance of regulatory oversight between the attention paid to those who fix car bodies and those that fix human bodies.
More Marshall
Act on previous reform recommendations that can most reduce costs and premiums, strengthen industry oversight and increase consumer protection. This recommendation refers to Appendix 9 wherein we see Mr. Marshall frequently referenced
Those Pesky HSPs
Return to on-site inspections of HSPs as soon as operationally possible;
Require HSPs to provide evidence (such as through attestation) that they have corrected all issues identified during an inspection and conduct follow-up examinations or desk reviews to confirm this on a risk basis.
I note the convergence of this recommendation with FSRA’s recent HSP Supervision Plan which suggests a focus on those:
that conduct IEs examinations to assist an insurer’s determination of an insured person is or continues to be entitled to a benefit
that have never been examined by FSRA
that have a sanctioned practitioner listed on their HCAI roster
LAT Facts & Fairness
Expand information-sharing with the LAT to request information about automobile accident disputes, including which companies were involved and how long cases took to resolve
follow up the market conduct of insurance companies that have a disproportionately high number of LAT disputes relative to their market size, or a high volume of specific types of disputes, and identify necessary action items for the companies to take to reduce the occurrence of such cases going forward and study the reasons for the most frequent types of disputes. Be still my beating heart! Winter may be coming but spring could be around the corner.
